Ulrich  Middeldorf 


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Indeed  he  was  a  true  model  of  worth ;  a  man  fit  for  conquest, 
plantation,  reformation,  or  what  action  soever  is  greatest  and 
hardest  amongst  men ;  withal  such  a  lover  of  mankind  and 
goodness,  that  whoever  had  any  real  parts,  in  him  found  com- 
fort, participation,  and  protection  to  the  uttermost  of  his  power. 

FULKE  GrEVILLE,  Life  of  Sidney. 

The  excellencies  of  this  admirable  essay  are  equally  conspic- 
uous, whether  we  regard  the  purity  and  simplicity  of  its  style, 
the  strength  and  soundness  of  its  reasoning,  the  rich  fervor  of 
its  eloquence,  or  the  variety  and  aptness  of  its  illustrations.  In 
short,  nothing  is  wanting  to  make  the  Defense  of  Poesy  a  piece 
of  writing  that,  in  a  similar  space,  is  not  to  be  paralleled  in  our 
language.  And  regarding  it  as  an  essay  on  the  nature,  objects, 
and  effects  of  poetry  as  an  art,  it  is  also  beyond  comparison  the 
most  complete  work  of  the  kind  which  we  possess,  even  up  to 
the  present  day ;  —  which  is  not  a  little  singular,  considering 
that  it  was  written  before  we  had  achieved  a  poetry  of  our  own, 
and  at  a  period,  too,  when  it  appears  that  the  art  itself  was  held 
in  but  slight  respect  at  all  events,  if  not  in  mere  contempt. 

Retrospective  Review  (for  1824)  10  :  44. 

Sidney  may  be  regarded  as  the  earliest  and  the  greatest 
aesthetician  —  in  Schiller's  sense  of  that  term  —  that  England 
has  ever  produced. 

Flugel'S  Edition  (1889),  p.  xlix. 

As  a  master  of  the  living  English  of  his  time,  he  must  rank 
among  the  highest.  Even  to  modern  readers  his  diction  is  rich 
and  varied  ;  the  fitting  word  is  chosen  with  an  apparent  ease  that 
implies  a  great  power  over  the  language. 

MiNTO,  Manual  of  English  Prose  Literature. 


THE  DEFENSE   OF  POESY 


OTHERWISE  KNOWN  AS 

AN  APOLOGY  FOR  POETRY 


EDITED 

WITH  INTRODUCTION  AND  NOTES 
BY 

ALBERT  S.  COOK 

PROFESSOR  OF  THE  ENGLISH  LANGUAGE  AND  LITERATURE 
IN  YALE  UNIVERSITY 


BOSTON 

PUBLISHED  BY  GINN  &  COMPANY 
1890 


Entered,  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1890,  by 

ALBERT  S.  COOK, 
in  the  Office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress,  at  Washington. 

All  Rights  Reserved. 


Typography  by  J.  S.  Cushing  &  Co.,  Boston. 
Presswork  by  Ginn  &  Co.,  Boston. 


TO 

MINTON  WARREN 

FRIENDSHIP  AND  GRATITUDE 


PREFACE. 


Sidney's  estimate  of  poetry  heralded  such  poetic  achieve- 
ment as  the  world  had  only  once  or  twice  witnessed.  What 
Sidney  outlined,  Spenser  and  Shakespeare  executed,  though 
not  always  in  the  precise  forms  which  he  himself  would 
have  approved.  In  this  essay  he  appears  as  a  link  between 
the  soundest  theory  of  ancient  times  and  the  romantic  pro- 
duction of  the  modern  era,  as  a  humanist  actuated  by  ethi- 
cal convictions,  as  a  man  of  affairs  discharging  the  function 
of  the  scholar  with  the  imaginative  insight  of  the  poet.  To 
assist  in  placing  the  student  of  English  literature  at  the 
point  of  view  from  which  he  can  rightly  judge  of  the  merits 
and  relations  of  Sidney's  immortal  disquisition  is  the  object 
of  the  present  editor's  labors. 

In  modernizing  the  spelling  and  punctuation  of  the  text, 
I  have  been  guided  by  the  principles  which  have  been  well 
expressed  by  Dr.  Edwin  A.  Abbott,  in  the  Preface  to  his 
edition  of  Bacon's  Essays,  pp.  iii-iv :  "  As  regards  speUing, 
the  principle  adopted  in  the  following  pages  is  this  :  what- 
ever quotations  or  extracts  are  made  for  critical  or  antiqua- 
rian purposes  are  printed  with  the  old  spelling,  but  the 
Essays  themselves  are  placed  on  the  same  footing  as  the 
Bible  and  Shakespeare  ;  and,  as  being  not  for  an  age  but 
for  all  ages,  they  are  spelt  with  the  spelling  of  this  age. 


vi 


PREFACE, 


Still  less  scruple  has  been  felt  in  departing  from  the  old 
punctuation ;  it  has  no  right  to  be  considered  Bacon's ;  it 
often  makes  absolute  nonsense  of  a  passage ;  it  sometimes 
produces  ambiguities  that  may  well  cause  perplexities  even 
to  intelligent  readers ;  and  its  retention  can  only  be  valuable 
to  archaeologists  as  showing  how  little  importance  should  be 
attached  to  the  commas  and  colons  scattered  at  random 
through  their  pages  by  the  Elizabethan  compositors.'' 

My  obligations  to  various  scholars  will  be  found  recorded 
in  their  proper  places  in  the  Notes ;  but  I  take  pleasure  in 
bringing  together,  in  the  order  of  their  citation,  the  names 
of  Dr.  J.  A.  H.  Murray  of  Oxford,  Mr.  Ralph  O.  Williams 
of  New  Haven,  Prof.  T.  F.  Crane  of  Cornell  University, 
Prof.  Daniel  G.  Brinton  of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania, 
Prof.  Bernadotte  Perrin  of  Adelbert  University,  and  Prof. 
Thomas  D.  Goodell  of  Yale  University. 

A.  S.  C. 

New  Haven,  July  4,  1890. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

Introduction   ix 

Sketch  of  Sidney's  Life  ,  ix 

Date  of  Composition  and  Publication   xii 

Learning   xv 

Style   xxi 

Theory  of  Poetry  ^.   xxviii 

Followers  and  Imitators   xxxix 

Analysis   xli 

The  Defense  of  Poesy   i 

Notes   59 

Variants   134 

Index  of  Proper  Names   140 


INTRODUCTION. 


I.  Sketch  of  Sidney's  Life. 

{Adapted from  the  Chronicle  in  Arber's  edition.) 

Philip  Sidney  "  was  son  of  Sir  Henry  Sidney  by  the  Lady 
Mary  his  wife,  eldest  daughter  of  John  Dudley,  Duke  of 
Northumberland ;  was  born,  as  'tis  supposed,  at  Penhurst  in 
Kent,  29  November,  1554,  and  had  his  Christian  name  given 
to  him  by  his  father  from  King  PhiHp,  then  lately  married 
to  Queen  Mary"  (Wood,  AthencE  Oxonienses),  He  was 
the  eldest  of  three  sons  and  four  daughters.  Philip  Sidney 
and  Fulke  Greville,  both  of  the  same  age  (nine  years),  and 
who  became  friends  for  life,  enter  Shrewsbury  School  on 
the  same  day,  Oct.  17,  1564.  Fulke  Greville  thus  testifies  of 
his  schoolfellow :  "  Of  whose  youth  I  will  report  no  other 
wonder  but  thus,  that  though  I  lived  with  him,  and  knew 
him  from  a  child,  yet  I  never  knew  him  other  than  a  man  ; 
with  such  staidness  of  mind,  lovely  and  familiar  gravity,  as 
carried  grace  and  reverence  above  greater  years.  His  talk 
ever  of  knowledge,  and  his  very  play  tending  to  enrich  his 
mind,  so  as  even  his  teachers  found  something  in  him  to 
observe  and  learn,  above  that  which  they  had  usually  read 
or  taught ;  which  eminence  by  nature  and  industry  made 
his  worthy  father  style  Sir  Philip  in  my  hearing  (though 
I  unseen)  Lumen  familicB  suce^'  [the  light  of  his  family]. 

While  he  was  very  young,  he  was  sent  to  Christ  Church 
to  be  improved  in  all  sorts  of  learning  .  .  .  where  continuing 
till  he  was  about  17  years  of  age"  .  .  .  (Wood,  AthencE 
Oxonienses),    This  settlement  at  Oxford  was  made  when 


X 


INTRODUCTION. 


he  was  13  years  old.  On  May  25,  1572,  the  Queen  grants 
Phihp  Sidney  Hcense  to  go  abroad  with  three  servants  and 
four  horses.  On  May  26  he  leaves  London  in  the  train  of 
the  Earl  of  Lincoln,  Ambassador  to  the  French  King. 
August  9,  Charles  IX  makes  him  one  of  the  Gentlemen  of 
his  Chamber.  August  24,  the  Massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew  ; 
Sidney,  being  in  the  house  of  the  English  Ambassador,  Sir 
Francis  Walsingham,  is  safe.  He  however  soon  leaves 
Paris,  and  journeys  by  Heidelberg  to  Frankfort,  where  he 
meets  Hubert  Languet,  aged  54.  He  stays  at  Frankfort 
about  nine  months.  They  two  then  go  to  Vienna,  where, 
after  some  trips  to  Hungary,  Sidney  leaves  Languet,  and 
spends  eight  months  in  Italy,  chiefly  in  Venice,  Padua,  and 
Genoa.  He  returns  to  Vienna  in  November,  spends  his 
winter  there,  and,  coming  home  through  the  Low  Countries, 
reaches  England  on  May  31,  1575,  having  been  absent  a 
trifle  over  three  years,  from  the  age  of  1 7  till  that  of  20. 
In  the  same  year  introduced  to  Court  by  his  uncle,  the  Earl 
of  Leicester.  July  9-27,  1575,  is  at  the  famous  reception 
given  by  Leicester  to  the  Queen,  at  Kenilworth.  The  Court 
moves  to  Chartley  Castle,  where  PhiHp  is  supposed  first  to 
have  seen  '  Stella'  (Penelope,  daughter  of  Lord  Essex,  then 
aged  13  ;  afterwards  Lady  Rich).  The  sonnets  oi  Astrophel 
and  Stella  go  on  for  the  next  five  or  six  years.  In  1577,  at 
the  age  of  22,  is  sent  as  Ambassador  with  messages  of  con- 
dolence to  Rodolph  II,  the  new  emperor  of  Germany,  at 
Prague,  and  to  the  two  sons  of  Frederic  III,  late  Elector 
Palatine,  viz.,  Lewis  (now  Elector)  and  John  Casimir,  at 
Heidelberg.  In  May  of  1578,  on  the  coming  of  the  Court 
to  his  uncle's  at  Wanstead,  Sidney  writes  a  masque  entitled 
The  Lady  of  the  May,  About  this  time  Sidney  becomes 
acquainted  with  Gabriel  Harvey,  and  through  him  with 
Edmund  Spenser.  In  August,  1579,  Stephen  Gosson  pub- 
lishes The  .  School  of  Abuse,  and  on  Oct.  16  Spenser  writes 
to  Harvey  Sidney's  idea  of  it.     Soon  after  (Dec.  5) 


INTRODUCTION. 


xi 


Spenser's  Shephercfs  Calefidar  is  entered  at  Stationer's 
Hall.  In  1580  Sidney  writes  to  the  Queen  against  her 
marrying  the  Duke  of  Anjou,  and  while  virtually  ban- 
ished from  Court  writes  the  Arcadia,  and,  jointly  with  his 
sister,  translates  the  Psalms.  Early  in  1581  Sidney  is  a 
member  of  Parliament,  and  on  Sept.  30  Languet  dies  at 
Antwerp.  On  Jan.  8,  1583  the  Queen  knights  him,  and 
soon  after  he  marries  Frances,  daughter  of  Sir  Francis  Wal- 
singham.  In  this  year  he  probably  writes  the  Defense  of 
Poesy,  During  the  winter  of  1584-5  he  is  a  second  time 
member  of  Parliament.  His  daughter  Elizabeth,  afterward 
Countess  of  Rutland,  is  born  in  1585,  and  Sidney  projects 
an  expedition  to  America  with  Sir  Francis  Drake.  On  Nov. 
7,  1585  he  is  appointed  Governor  of  Flushing,  on  Nov.  16 
leaves  England  for  the  last  time,  and  on  Nov.  21  assumes 
his  office.  In  1586  his  father  and  mother  both  die.  On 
Sept.  22  of  this  year  the  fight  at  Zutphen  occurs.  Accord- 
ing to  the  Earl  of  Leicester's  account,  Sidney  "  received  a 
sore  wound  upon  his  thigh,  three  fingers  above  his  knee, 
the  bone  broken  quite  in  pieces."  Sidney  lingered  twenty- 
six  days,  his  last  words  being  these,  which  were  addressed 
to  his  brother  :  "  Love  my  memory,  cherish  my  friends ; 
their  faith  to  me  may  assure  you  they  were  honest.  But, 
above  all,  govern  your  will  and  affections  by  the  will  and 
word  of  your  Creator,  in  me  beholding  the  end  of  this  world 
with  all  her  vanities."  He  died  when  he  had  not  quite 
attained  his  thirty-second  year.  On  Oct.  24  his  body  was 
removed  to  Flushing,  embarked  there  for  conveyance  to 
London  on  Nov.  i,  landed  at  Tower  Hill  on  Nov.  5,  and 
taken  to  a  house  in  the  Minories,  without  Aldgate,  where  it 
remained  until  the  pubHc  funeral  at  St.  Paul's  on  Feb.  16, 
1587.  Volumes,"  says  Fox  Bourne  {Me7noir,  p.  534), 
would  be  filled  were  I  to  collect  all  the  praise  uttered  in 
prose,  and  still  more  extensively  in  verse,  by  Sir  Philip  Sid- 
ney's contemporaries  or  his  immediate  successors." 


xii 


INTRODUCTION. 


2.  Date  of  Composition  and  Publication. 

As  Sidney  refers  to  the  Shepherd's  Calendar  of  Spenser 
(47  14),  the  Defense  must  have  been  written  subsequent 
to  the  pubUcation  of  that  work,  which  was  entered  at  Sta- 
tioner's Hall  on  Dec.  5,  1579.  Moreover,  the  Defense  was 
in  some  measure  intended  as  a  reply  to  Gosson's  School  of 
Abuse,  which  appeared  about  August,  1579,  and  which  had 
certainly  been  examined  by  Sidney  before  the  middle  of 
October  of  that  year,  as  appears  from  Spenser's  letter  to 
Harvey. 

After  Sidney's  departure  from  England  to  serve  in  the 
Low  Countries,  Nov.  16,  1585,  he  would  have  had  no  leisure 
for  the  composition  of  such  a  work.  Accordingly  it  must 
have  been  written  between  1579  and  1585.  Arber  thinks 
"  that  the  vindication  followed  soon  upon  the  attack,"  and 
is  therefore  disposed  to  fix  the  date  of  the  Defense  in  1581. 
Fox  Bourne  says  (^Memoir,  p.  407)  :  "  The  Defense  of 
Foesie,  written  after  The  Arcadia  and  Astrophel  and  Stella, 
and  therefore  probably  not  until  the  year  1583."  In  expla- 
nation of  this,  it  must  be  remembered  that  the  Arcadia  was 
begun,  and  the  most  of  it  probably  written,  in  1580.  Fox 
Bourne  says  of  it  (^Memoir,  p.  345)  :  Having  commenced 
his  romance  in  the  summer  of  1580,  I  infer  that  Sidney  had 
written  about  three-quarters  of  the  whole,  and  all  which  has 
come  down  to  us  in  a  finished  state,  by  the  autumn  of  15  81." 
Some  time  must  be  allowed  for  the  change  in  Sidney's  style, 
the  abandonment  of  a  florid  and  sentimental  manner  of 
writing,  and  the  acquisition  of  that  sobriety  and  solidity  of 
diction  which  reflects  a  maturer  manhood.  This  progress 
toward  maturity  is  noted  by  Fox  Bourne  (p.  347)  :  His 
journey  to  Flanders,  in  the  early  spring  of  1582,  must  have 
interrupted  his  literary  work.  After  that  there  was  a  marked 
change  in  his  temper.  Honest  purposes  were  rising  in  him 
which  little  accorded  with  many  sentiments  in  the  half- 


INTRODUCTION, 


xiii 


written  romance.'*  The  argument  derived  from  the  change 
in  Sidney's  style,  the  index  of  a  corresponding  change  in  his 
temper  and  views,  seems  to  me  irresistible,  and  I  am  there- 
fore inclined  to  place  the  Defense  as  late  as  1583.  The  quiet 
happiness  of  the  first  months  succeeding  his  marriage  may 
have  been  especially  favorable  to  such  thoughtful  composi- 
tion. * 

Even  more  conducive  to  the  philosophical  meditation 
which  the  authorship  of  this  tractate  required  may  have  been 
his  friendship  with  a  famous  philosopher  and  highly  gifted 
nature,  who  in  that  year  came  to  England  and  entered  the 
circle  composed  of  Sidney  and  his  most  intimate  friends.  I 
refer  to  the  poet  and  mystic,  Giordano  Bruno,  a  precursor 
of  Bacon  and  martyr  of  the  Inquisition.  The  preparation 
for  the  Defense  necessitated  a  comparison  of  the  doctrines 
of  Plato  and  Aristotle  touching  poetry,  and  nothing  could 
well  have  served  as  a  more  urgent  stimulus  to  such  philo- 
sophical study  than  familiar  intercourse  with  Bruno,  at  home 
in  Platonism  and  Neoplatonism,  and  a  vigorous  assailant  of 
the  exclusive  authority  of  Aristotle.  Who  can  fail  to  recog- 
nize the  substantial  identity  of  Sidney's  reflection  on  the 
loveliness  of  virtue  (30  20-22),  not  only  with  the  common 
source  in  Plato,  but  also  with  the  following  sentiment  taken 
from  Bruno's  Heroic  Rapture,  which  was  dedicated  to  Sidney 
(quoted  in  Frith's  Life  of  Giordano  Bruno,  p.  125)  :  "  For  I 
am  assured  that  Nature  has  endowed  me  with  an  inward 
sense  by  which  I  reason  from  the  beauty  before  my  eyes  to 
the  light  and  eminence  of  more  excellent  spiritual  beauty, 
which  is  light,  majesty,  and  divinity."  The  impulse  given 
by  Bruno  would  be  precisely  that  which  Sidney  needed  in 
order  to  urge  him  to  clarify  his  ideas,  and  reduce  them  to 
the  orderly  form  in  which  they  are  presented  in  the  Defense. 
On  the  hypothesis  that  this  intimacy  with  Bruno  did  mark 
a  distinct  stage  in  Sidney's  spiritual  development,  we  can 
more  readily  comprehend  how  he  was  led  to  undertake  the 


xiv 


INTRODUCTION, 


translation  of  Duplessis  Mornay's  book  on  the  Truth  of  the 
Christian  ReUgion,  a  work  abounding  in  the  Neoplatonic 
views  with  which  Bruno's  philosophy  is  surcharged. 

The  reason  for  assigning  the  Defense  to  the  year  158 1 
has  less  weight  when  we  discover  that  it  is  much  more  than 
a  reply  to  Gosson,  that  the  argument  of  abuse  "  occupies 
a  comparatively  small  part  of  the  whole  treatise,  and  that 
the  positive,  constructive,  and  critical  element  of  it  is  what 
constitutes  its  chief  value.  Were  we  to  assume,  with  Gro- 
sart  (see  p.  xxxviii),  that  Spenser,  perhaps  before  Gosson's 
attack  was  issued,  suggested  such  a  positive  and  constructive 
work  to  Sidney,  if  he  did  not  actually  have  a  hand  in  the 
planning  of  Sidney's  own  tract,  there  would  be  still  less 
ground  for  believing  that  Sidney  hastened  to  reply,  espe- 
cially as  there  had  been  at  least  one  confutation  of  Gosson's 
pamphlet  attempted  in  the  year  1579,  under  the  title  of 
Honest  Excuses.  In  Gosson's  Apology  of  the  School  of 
Abuse  (Arber's  ed.,  p.  73),  we  read:  "It  is  told  me  that 
they  have  got  one  in  London  to  write  certain  Honest 
Excuses^  so  they  term  it,  to  their  dishonest  abuses  which  I 
revealed.'*  This  Apology  was  written  in  1579,  and  within 
a  year  or  so  Thomas  Lodge  had  written  his  Defense,  unless 
we  assume  that  this  is  identical  with  the  Honest  Excuses,  as 
has  been  done  by  some.  In  any  event,  we  may  be  sure 
that  there  was  no  lack  of  ephemeral  strictures,  conceived  in 
the  same  kind  as  the  School  of  Abuse  itself.  What  was 
wanted  was  a  dignified  discussion  of  the  whole  subject, 
based  upon  a  profound  and  dispassionate  view  of  the  prin- 
ciples involved,  and  this,  so  different  in  every  way  from  a 
hasty  compilation,  spiced  with  virulent  epigrams,  or  what 
passed  for  such,  Sidney  would  have  been  in  no  haste  to 
publish.  To  these  considerations  in  favor  of  the  later  date 
may  be  added  the  opinion  of  Collier  {Hist.  Eng.  Dram. 
Poetry,  2.  422-3  and  3.  374),  who  believes  it  to  have  been 
written  "  about  the  year  1583." 


INTRODUCTION. 


XV 


The  Defense  was  not  published  till  1595,  and  then  by  two 
different  printers,  Olney  and  Ponsonby.  The  former  gave 
it  the  title,  An  Apologie  for  Foe  trie  ;  the  latter.  The  Defence 
of  Poesie.  It  is  doubtful  which  of  these  appeared  the  earlier 
(Fliigel's  ed.,  pp.  65,  66).  Sidney  himself  refers  to  the 
treatise  as  "  a  pitiful  defense  of  poor  poetry  "  (but  cf  p.  xxxix) . 

3.  Learning. 

Like  Bacon  and  Shakespeare,  Sidney  was  a  diligent  stu- 
dent of  Plutarch,  and  scarcely  less  of  the  Morals  than  of  the 
Lives,  On  the  19th  of  December,  1573,  he  wrote  from 
Venice  to  his  friend  Languet,  asking  for  a  copy  of  Plutarch 
in  French.  The  indications  accordingly  are  that  he  did 
not  then  read  Greek  with  much  fluency.  His  words  are 
(Fox  Bourne,  Memoir,  p.  74)  :  "  If  you  can  pick  them  up 
in  Vienna,  I  wish  you  would  send  me  Plutarch's  works  trans- 
lated into  French.  I  would  willingly  pay  five  times  their 
value  for  them."  Languet  repHed  that  for  all  the  money 
in  the  world  he  could  not  buy  a  copy  of  Plutarch,  though 
perhaps  he  might  borrow  one"  (Fox  Bourne,  p.  75).  This 
answer  is  not  a  httle  surprising,  seeing  that  Amyot's  French 
translation  of  the  Lives,  from  which  the  English  rendering 
by  North  was  afterward  made,  appeared  in  1559,  that  of  the 
Morals  not  being  pubHshed,  however,  till  1574.  North's 
version  was  issued  in  1579,  but  long  before  this  time  Sidney 
was  no  doubt  able  to  read  Greek  with  much  greater  ease, 
and  in  any  case  must  have  familiarized  himself  with  the  mat- 
ter of  Plutarch.  No  one  among  the  ancients  was  so  abun- 
dant a  source  of  illustration  to  the  moralists  and  essayists  of 
the  sixteenth  century.  It  is  for  his  store  of  anecdote  and 
his  living  traits  of  the  great  men  of  antiquity  that  Sidney 
chiefly  uses  him,  though  it  is  clear  that  he  had  likewise 
become  strongly  imbued  with  Plutarch's  ethical  sentiments, 
except  in  so  far  as  they  were  condemned  or  superseded  by 
the  purer  tenets  of  Christianity. 


xvi 


INTR  OD  UC  TION. 


Sidney's  favorite  among  the  Latin  prosaists  was  unques- 
tionably Cicero.  To  him,  as  to  the  men  of  the  Kterary 
Renaissance  generally,  Cicero  was  the  unrivalled  model  of 
style.  Sidney's  ear  wa*s  charmed  by  the  harmonious  ca- 
dences of  the  great  rhetorician,  while  his  imagination  was 
fired  by  Cicero's  ostensible  fervor  of  patriotism,  his  oratori- 
cal indignation  or  zeal,  his  prodigality  of  information  and 
allusion,  and,  perhaps  beyond  everything  else,  by  the  re- 
flected glories  of  the  ancient  Roman  State.  If  the  style  of 
the  master  partakes  somewhat  too  much  of  Asiatic  grandil- 
oquence and  floridity,  and  somewhat  too  little  of  Attic  re- 
finement and  moderation,  we  should  not  be  greatly  surprised 
if  we  find  the  pupil  occasionally  proving  his  aptness  by  a 
clever  imitation  of  the  blemishes,  as  well  as  the  beauties,  of 
his  original.  We  must  not  be  unjust  to  Sidney  because  the 
sounding  brass  of  Cicero  sometimes  gave  forth  in  his  hands 
the  tone  of  the  clanging  cymbal.  It  must  be  remembered 
that  the  mind  of  England  had  been  largely  nourished  upon 
the  Psalmists  and  Prophets  of  the  Old  Testament,  and  had 
thus  acquired  a  certain  hking  for  the  splendor  of  Oriental 
imagery,  as  well  as  the  pomp  and  harmonies  of  Oriental 
language.  To  this  must  be  added  the  familiarity  with  the 
mediaeval  romances  which  came  in  the  train  of  the  Crusades, 
many  of  which  were  fragrant  with  the  breath  of  the  East. 
Finally,  a  fresh  wave  of  Orientalism  was  now  pouring  upon 
France  and  England  from  the  land  of  chivalrous  thoughts 
and  high  emprise,  the  Spain  of  the  Moors  and  the  Castilian 
kings,  of  Guevara  and  Montemayor.  Instead  of  wondering, 
therefore,  that  Sidney  could  endure,  much  less  imitate,  the 
Asianism  with  which  Cicero's  style,  notwithstanding  its  many 
beauties,  is  still  infected,  we  should  rather  wonder  that  he 
possessed  the  vigor  of  understanding  and  sense  of  form 
which  are  unmistakable  in  his  theory  and  in  the  best  of  his 
practice,  and  that  he  was  able  to  make  so  firm  a  stand 
against  those  tendencies  of  his  time  which  resulted  in  the 
pedantries  and  imbecilities  of  Euphuism. 


INTRODUCTION, 


xvu 


Languet,  Sidney's  early  and  revered  friend,  is  to  be  held 
partly  responsible  for  his  application  to  Cicero,  as  well  as 
for  any  undue  attachment  to  the  Latin  writers  in  general. 
In  response  to  Sidney's  letter  quoted  above,  penned  when 
Sidney  was  but  19,  Languet  wrote  :  You  ask  me  how  you 
ought  to  form  a  style  of  writing.  In  my  opinion  you  cannot 
do  better  than  give  careful  study  to  all  Cicero's  letters,  not 
only  for  the  sake  of  the  graceful  Latin,  but  also  on  account 
of  the  weighty  truths  which  they  contain.  . .  .  But  take  care 
of  slipping  into  the  heresy  of  those  who  believe  that  Cicero- 
nianism  is  the  summum  bonum,  and  who  will  spend  a  hfe- 
time  in  aiming  after  it. .  .  .  When  you  begin  to  read  Cicero's 
letters  you  will  hardly  need  Plutarch"  (Fox  Bourne,  pp. 
74-5).  This  was  soon  followed  by  more  counsel  of  similar 
tenor :  "  Greek  Hterature,  again,  is  a  very  beautiful  study ; 
but  I  fear  you  will  have  no  leisure  to  follow  it  through,  and 
whatever  time  you  give  to  it  you  steal  from  Latin,  which, 
though  less  elegant  than  Greek,  is  far  better  worth  your 
knowing"  (Fox  Bourne,  p.  76).  Fortunately,  as  we  shall 
see,  Sidney  was  too  wise  to  yield  implicit  obedience  to  his 
Mentor  with  reference  to  the  neglect  of  Greek  Hterature, 
and,  even  before  writing  the  Defense,  his  eyes  had  been 
opened  to  the  folly  of  excessive  devotion  to  the  niceties  of 
Latin  style.  In  1580,  when  he  had  reached  the  age  of  25, 
he  wrote  to  his  brother  Robert :  So  you  can  speak  and 
write  Latin  not  barbarously,  I  never  require  great  study  in 
Ciceronianism,  the  chief  abuse  of  Oxford,  qui,  du7n  vej^ba 
sectdiiiur,  res  ipsas  negligunt'^  [who,  in  their  application  to 
words,  neglect  the  things  themselves].  This  sounds  like  an 
anticipation  of  Bacon's  judgment  {Adv,  Learning,  i.  4.  2,  3)  : 
"  This  grew  speedily  to  an  excess ;  for  men  began  to  hunt 
more  after  words  than  matter ;  more  after  the  choiceness 
of  the  phrase,  and  the  round  and  clean  composition  of  the 
sentence,  and  the  sweet  falHng  of  the  clauses,  and  the  vary- 
ing and  illustration  of  their  works  with  tropes  and  figures, 


xviii 


INTRODUCTION. 


than  after  the  weight  of  matter,  worth  of  subject,  soundness 
of  argument,  Hfe  of  invention,  or  depth  of  judgment.  .  .  . 
Here,  therefore,  is  the  first  distemper  of  learning,  when  men 
study  words  and  not  matter."  Yet,  notwithstanding  Sidney's 
discernment  of  this  weighty  truth,  and  the  progress  in  sim- 
phcity  made  between  the  writing  of  the  Arcadia  and  that 
of  the  Defense^  it  is  but  too  evident  that  what  may  be 
called  the  vices  of  Ciceronianism  still  continued  to  corrupt 
his  style  in  an  appreciable  degree,  or  else  that  the  element 
of  purer  Atticism  in  it  had  not  been  an  effectual  antidote 
against  the  Asianism  derived  from  other  sources. 

In  one  respect  the  study  of  Cicero  was  an  almost  unmixed 
benefit  to  Sidney.  More  than  any  other  author  except  Plu- 
tarch, Cicero  seems  to  have  acquainted  him  with  the  history 
of  the  ancient  world.  He  was  to  Sidney  a  mine  of  informa- 
tion about  all  sorts  of  subjects  —  lives  of  men,  traits  of 
manners,  and  philosophies  —  besides  supplying  him  with 
more  than  one  epigrammatic  sally  which  only  needed  to 
be  translated  into  English,  and  deftly  introduced,  to  adorn 
the  page  on  which  it  appeared. 

With  the  two  chief  epic  poets  of  antiquity,  Homer  and 
Virgil,  Sidney  had  a  familiar  acquaintance.  Virgil  occupies 
the  first  place  in  his  affections,  but  he  is  by  no  means  insen- 
sible to  the  superior  loftiness  and  naturalness  of  Homer. 
As  a  highly  educated  man  of  that  day,  he  knew  well  his 
Horace  and  Ovid,  the  dramatists  Plautus  and  Terence,  the 
satirists  Juvenal  and  Persius,  the  historians  Livy,  Suetonius, 
Justin,  and  even  the  authors  of  the  Augustan  Histories,  mor- 
alists like  Seneca  and  the  Pseudo-Cato,  and  perhaps  Lucre- 
tius and  Quintilian.  Of  these  the  first  four  were  perhaps 
preferred  to  the  others.  More  remarkable,  because  less 
usual  at  that  day,  was  his  knowledge  of  the  Greeks.  Be- 
sides Plutarch  and  Homer,  who  have  already  been  men- 
tioned, he  admires  and  repeatedly  mentions  the  Cyropcedia 
of  Xenophon.    Of  the  three  tragedians,  he  was  apparently 


INTRODUCTION. 


xix 


best  acquainted  with  Euripides,  though  typical  plays  of  both 
Sophocles  and  y^^schylus  had  been  included  in  his  reading. 
Of  Plato  and  Aristotle  I  speak  under  another  head,  that  of 
Sidney's  Theory  of  Poetry.  Here  it  is  sufficient  to  say  that 
the  dialogues  of  Plato  which  he  had  apparently  studied  with 
most  care  are  the  lon^  Symposium,  PhcedruSy  Sophist,  Phcedo, 
and  Republic,  and  that  he  was  conversant  with  at  least 
the  Poetics  and  Ethics  of  Aristotle,  and  perhaps  with  the 
Rhetoric, 

The  incidental  mention  of  such  authors  as  Solon,  Tyrtaeus, 
and  others,  proves  nothing  as  to  Sidney's  personal  knowl- 
edge of  their  writings.  Many  of  these  names,  hke  those  of 
Orpheus  and  Musseus,  were  freely  introduced  into  literary 
works  and  learned  discussions,  merely  on  the  strength  of 
similar  mention  of  them  in  ancient  writings  of  a  relatively 
late  period,  and  the  commonplaces  concerning  them  are 
therefore  to  be  expected  in  any  sixteenth  century  pamphlet 
or  treatise  on  the  subject  of  poetry  or  literary  history.  But 
there  are  others,  such  as  Herodotus  and  Theocritus,  whom 
Sidney  mentions  in  such  a  way  as  to  lead  us  to  believe 
that  he  knew  them  otherwise  than  from  mere  hearsay.  Even 
the  Greeks  of  the  post-classical  age  were  not  beyond  the 
pale  of  his  curiosity,  as  is  shown  by  his  praise  of  the  romance 
of  Heliodorus. 

In  his  quotations  from  the  ancients  Sidney  is  frequently 
inaccurate.  We  should  not  infer  that  in  this  respect  he  is 
singular  among  the  Elizabethans ;  Bacon,  not  to  mention 
others,  does  not  always  adhere  strictly  to  the  phraseology  of 
his  author.  Such  inaccuracy  is  of  doubtful  interpretation  in 
an  age  not  distinguished  for  scientific  exactness.  It  may 
indicate  either  a  deficiency  or  a  plenitude  of  scholarship, 
and  our  decision  in  favor  of  the  one  or  the  other  should 
depend  upon  collateral  evidence.  Evidence  of  this  nature 
is  not  altogether  wanting  as  respects  the  fulness  and  essen- 
tial justness  of  Sidney's  learning.    It  is  found  in  his  general 


XX 


INTRODUCTION. 


mastery  of  a  difficult  subject,  but  also  in  his  manner  of  hand- 
ling, and  as  it  were  playing  with,  some  of  the  quotations 
he  employs.  Now  he  changes  the  form  of  a  verb  from  the 
second  person  to  the  first,  in  order  to  appropriate  to  himself 
a  citation  from  Horace.  Again  for  two  nouns  he  substitutes 
their  antonyms,  that  he  may  adapt  a  line  from  Ovid  to  his 
purpose.  In  these  and  similar  cases  his  learning  seems  to 
be  so  entirely  at  command  that  he  can  mold  and  twist  it 
to  suit  all  the  vagaries  of  a  sportive  humor.  Less  conclusive 
is  his  amphfication  of  the  famous  apostrophe  in  the  First 
Oration  against  CatiHne  (53  24,  note).  Here,  in  his  en- 
deavor to  illustrate  a  rhetorical  artifice,  he  appears  to  extend 
the  quotation  in  order  to  make  the  illustration  more  telling. 
Unless  the  Elizabethan  text  of  Cicero  differed  materially  from 
that  now  accepted,  this  variation  must  be  laid  to  the  account 
of  dishonesty  or  to  that  of  a  treacherous  memory.  No  one 
who  has  formed  an  opinion  concerning  Sidney's  character 
would  accuse  him  of  deliberate  dishonesty,  and  hence  we 
have  no  alternative  except  to  suppose  that  his  verbal  memory 
was  at  times  untrustworthy.  All  things  considered,  the  accu- 
racy of  his  learning  could  probably  be  impeached,  and  has 
perhaps  often  been  surpassed,  by  the  best  of  our  contem- 
porary writers ;  yet  it  is  none  the  less  true  that  the  extent 
of  his  reading,  and  the  degree  to  which  he  rendered  the 
substance  of  books  tributary  to  the  expression  of  his  own 
convictions  and  essential  manhood,  might  well  put  to  shame 
many  who  are  rightly  esteemed  his  superiors  in  technical 
and  minute  scholarship. 

Sidney  refers  to  numerous  contemporary  humanists,  Ital- 
ian, German,  French,  and  Enghsh,  whose  names  it  would  be 
tedious  and  unprofitable  to  enumerate,  especially  as  they  are 
all  contained  in  the  Index  of  Proper  Names.  An  exception 
must  be  made  in  favor  of  the  elder  Scaliger,  to  whose  Poet- 
ics  Sidney's  indebtedness  is  not  inconsiderable.  In  Italian 
literature  his  range  is  from  Dante  to  Ariosto,  and  in  English 


INTRODUCTION. 


XXI 


from  Chaucer  to  his  personal  friend  Spenser.  How  lively 
was  his  interest  in  Italian  authors  we  may  infer  from  his 
friendship  with  Giordano  Bruno,  and  the  terms  in  which  the 
latter  dedicates  to  him  two  of  his  important  works.  Sidney 
read  Spanish  with  ease,  as  we  may  infer  not  only  from  his 
imitation  of  Montemayor,  but  from  his  use  of  Oviedo,  though 
it  is  just  possible  that  the  latter  may  have  been  accessible  to 
him  in  translation.  With  respect  to  poetry  there  appears  to 
have  been  a  substantial  identity  of  opinion  on  many  points 
between  himself  and  Cervantes,  and,  in  a  less  degree,  be- 
tween himself  and  Lope  de  Vega.  Of  his  love  for  all  that 
illustrated  the  riches  of  the  English  tongue,  and  of  his  ardent 
desire  that  the  glories  of  its  literature  should  be  still  further 
enhanced,  these  pages  furnish  ample  proof. 

Finally,  Sidney  was  a  diligent  and  enthusiastic  student  of 
the  Scriptures  of  the  Old  and  New  Testaments,  both  in 
themselves  and  in  commentaries  upon  them.  Not  only  did 
he  endeavor  to  guide  his  life  according  to  their  precepts, 
but  he  delighted  in  them  as  literature.  His  appreciation  of 
the  poetry  of  the  Bible  is  shown  by  his  translation  of  the  first 
forty-three  Psalms,  and  not  less  by  his  glowing,  yet  reverent, 
estimates  of  the  parables  of  Christ,  the  hymns  of  Moses  and 
Deborah,  the  dramatic  poem  of  Job,  and  the  lyric  or  didac- 
tic compositions  of  Solomon.  In  the  Sacred  Writings  he 
discovered  something  that  corresponded  to  every  element  of 
his  manhood,  and  while  their  beauty  and  sublimity  enthralled 
his  aesthetic  sensibiUty,  he  was  ready  to  acknowledge  in 
them  a  diviner  efficacy  which  transcended  the  efforts  of  the 
human  spirit  to  fathom,  as  when  he  exclaimed  upon  his 
death-bed,  "  How  unsearchable  the  mysteries  of  God's  Word 
are  !"  (Fox  Bourne,  p.  512.) 

4.  Style. 

Sidney  has  sometimes  been  called  a  Euphuist.  This  term 
has  been,  so  loosely  employed  that  it  would  be  unprofitable 


xxii 


INTRODUCTION. 


to  examine  the  appropriateness  of  the  designation  without 
first  defining  what  is  to  be  understood  by  Euphuism.  For- 
tunately, substantial  unanimity  has  been  reached  by  the 
competent  investigators  of  the  subject,  and  it  is  possible  to 
utilize,  without  lengthy  beating  of  the  air,  the  labors  of  a 
scholar  who  is  recognized  as  one  of  the  foremost  expounders 
of  the  modern  theory  of  Euphuism.  This  authority,  Dr. 
Frederick  Landmann,  has  formulated  the  law  of  Euphuism 
in  the  following  brief  sentence  (^Euphues^  Heilbronn  1887, 
Introduction,  p.  xv,  note)  :  "  I  consider  transverse  aUitera- 
tion  in  parisonic  antithetical  or  parallel  clauses  as  the  indis- 
pensable criterion  of  the  presence  of  Euphuism." 

This  sentence  is  enigmatic  in  proportion  to  its  brevity, 
and  demands  a  commentary  to  make  it  intelhgible.  The 
commentary,  which  will  be  extracted  from  the  same  work, 
adds  to  the  criterion  already  given  a  third  peculiarity,  which 
Landmann  seems  to  regard  as  inferior  in  importance  to 
the  one,  or  rather  two,  comprised  in  the  sentence  already 
quoted  (Landmann,  pp.  xv-xvi)  :  ^^We  here  have  the  most 
elaborate  antithesis  not  only  of  well-balanced  sentences,  but 
also  of  words,  often  even  of  syllables.  .  .  .  Even  when  he 
uses  a  single  sentence,  he  opposes  the  words  within  this 
clause  to  each  other.  When  we  find  a  principal  and  a  sub- 
ordinate clause  we  may  be  sure  that  two,  three  or  all  of  the 
words  of  the  former  are  opposed  to  an  equal  number  in  the 
latter.  This  we  call  parisonic  antithesis.  .  .  .  The  sec- 
ond class  of  elements  peculiar  to  Lyly's  style  are  alliteration, 
consonance,  rhyme,  playing  upon  words,  and  the  use  of 
syllables  sounding  alike.  These  embellishments  he  uses  to 
point  out  the  respective  corresponding  words  in  his  antithet- 
ical clauses.  It  is  not  continuous  alliteration  as  we  have  it 
in  almost  every  writer  of  the  sixteenth  century  from  Surrey 
to  Spenser,  which  was  condemned  by  Wilson,  Puttenham, 
and  others,  but  transverse,  as  it  has  been  very  aptly  termed 
by  Weymouth :  e.g.  '  Although  hetherto  Euphues  I  have 


INTR  OD  UC  TION. 


xxiii 


i-y^rinecl  thee  in  my  /2eart  for  a  /rustic /riende,  I  will  i-/mnne 
thee  //eerafter  as  a  /rothles /oe.'  The  third  distinctive  ele- 
ment of  Euphuism  is  the  tendency  to  confirm  a  statement 
by  a  long  series  of  illustrations,  comparisons,  exempla  and 
short  similes,  nearly  always  introduced  by  *  for  as  —  ' ;  these 
he  takes  from  ancient  history  and  mythology,  from  daily  life, 
and,  last  but  not  least,  from  Pliny's  fabulous  natural  history, 
translating  Pliny  literally  in  the  latter  case." 

Landmann's  opinion  concerning  Sidney's  style  is  based 
upon  the  Arcadia,  and  it  is  in  this,  rather  than  in  the  De- 
fense, that  we  should  expect  to  find  the  distinctive  marks  of 
Euphuism.  Notwithstanding,  Landmann  denies  that  Sidney 
belongs  to  this  school  (p.  xxx)  :  But  we  see  that  Sidney 
avoided  Lyly's  artificial  combination  of  parisonic  antithesis 
with  transverse  alliteration,  as  well  as  his  absurd  similes  taken 
from  Pliny  ;  in  other  words,  the  most  characteristic  elements 
of  Euphuism."  The  statement  concerning  the  similes  from 
natural  and  unnatural  history  is  confirmed  by  the  quotation 
from  Drayton,  cited  in  the  note  to  54  12.  In  only  one  sen- 
tence of  the  Defense  (2  24-27)  is  there  any  indication  to 
the  contrary,  and  this  I  surmise  to  have  been  intended  as  a 
parody  of  Gosson's  manner  (see  the  note  on  this  passage). 

The  stylistic  peculiarities  of  Sidney's  romance  Landmann 
comprehends  under  the  term  Arcadianism,  which  he  thus 
describes  (p.  xxviii)  :  "The  elements  of  style  in  Sidney's 
Arcadia  are  different  from  those  of  Euphuism.  In  brief, 
they  consist  in  endless  tedious  sentences,  one  sometimes 
filling  a  whole  page,  in  the  fondness  for  details,  and  in  the 
description  of  the  beauties  of  rural  scenery.  Instead  of 
Lyly's  exempla  and  shortened  similes  with  *  for  as  —  so,'  we 
here  have  minutely  worked  out  comparisons  and  conceits 
couched  in  excessively  metaphorical  language,  quaint  circum- 
locutions for  simple  expressions,  and  bold  personifications  of 
inanimate  objects.  Besides,  Sidney  is  fond  of  playing  upon 
words,  and  is  not  averse  to  simple  alHteration." 


xxiv 


INTRODUCTION. 


Having  thus  distinguished  Arcadianism  from  Euphuism, 
Landmann  affords  us  no  further  aid  in  determining  to  what 
extent,  if  at  all,  the  style  of  the  Defense  is  Arcadian.  This, 
however,  we  can  readily  do  for  ourselves.  Of  the  charac- 
teristics noted  by  Landmann,  we  may  at  once  dismiss  all 
except  the  very  last.  As  shown  in  the  note  on  4  ii,  Sid- 
ney is  indeed  fond  of  playing  upon  words,  and  occasionally 
indulges  in  alhteration.  The  instances  of  the  latter  are  but 
few,  and  would  never  be  remarked  were  it  not  for  the  verbal 
jingles  which  fall  under  the  former  head.  At  times  this 
vainly  repetitious  form  of  Arcadianism  is  nothing  but  Cic- 
eronianism  of  a  rather  indefensible  sort,  and  any  censure 
passed  upon  Sidney  for  his  transgression  of  good  taste  is  but 
too  apt  to  light  upon  the  idol  of  the  Renaissance  humanists 
(cf.  note  on  54  32).  It  was  hardly  to  be  expected  that  this 
stumbling-block  should  be  altogether  avoided  by  men  who 
thought  it  a  venial  fault  to  love  language  in  some  measure 
for  its  own  sake,  —  so  long  at  least  as  they  were  under  the 
exclusive  sway  of  the  Latins.  We  must  not  forget  that  it 
was  a  besetting  peccadillo  of  Shakespeare,  and  does  it  not 
too  often  excite  the  smile  of  pitying  derision  as  we  turn 
the  majestic  page  of  Milton?  Nothing  less  than  passionate 
reverence  for  the  severe  purity  of  the  chastest  Attic  could 
avail  to  remove  this  blemish  from  modern  writing.  But  at 
that  time  a  familiarity  with  Greek  models  of  composition 
naturally  drew  after  it  a  practice  scarcely  less  opposed  to 
the  more  rigorous  canons  of  artistic  prose. 

The  employment  of  such  compound  words  as  are  fitted 
to  heighten  the  style  of  dithyrambic  and  other  elevated  poe- 
try, was  interdicted  to  prose  on  the  authority  of  Aristotle. 
The  formation  of  these  compounds  is  alien  to  the  genius  of 
certain  modern  tongues,  such  as  French.  Yet  even  this 
native  lack  of  plasticity  was  vanquished,  for  a  time  at 
least,  by  the  Hellenizing  impulse  which  swept  over  the  six- 
teenth century.    The  stubbornness  of  French  was  forced  to 


INTRODUCTION. 


XXV 


yield  to  the  pertinacity  of  Du  Bartas,  while  the  more  pliable 
English,  mindful  of  an  earlier  power  which  had  been  spell- 
bound into  enacting  the  part  of  the  Sleeping  Beauty,  re- 
sponded quickly  to  the  efforts  made  by  Chapman  and  others 
to  imitate  in  their  own  tongue  the  magnificent  rhythmical 
combinations  which  constitute  so  material  a  part  of  the 
Homeric  and  Pindaric  charm.  The  reward  of  Du  Bartas 
was  a  doubtful  and  ephemeral  success ;  the  fashion  he  set 
soon  went  the  way  of  all  attempts  to  set  aside  natural  law. 
French  poetry  promptly  discarded  these  compounds,  and 
it  may  be  said  that  French  prose  never  accepted  them. 
Not  so  in  England.  Here  they  were  soon  rendered  popular 
in  consequence  of  their  adoption  by  the  dramatists,  and 
even  earher  began  to  appear  in  prose  fiction.  These  com- 
pounds form  one  feature  of  Arcadianism,  and  one  which 
Sidney  never  wholly  outgrew.  Accordingly  we  find  them 
scattered  throughout  the  Defense,  just  as  they  occur  in  the 
more  florid  prose  of  our  own  day  (cf.  note  on  55  25). 
Whatever  may  be  urged  against  their  employment,  they  are 
certainly  an  indication  of  formative  energy,  and  the  state- 
ment of  a  literary  historian  about  Lucretius  may  be  applied, 
with  an  obvious  difference,  to  Sidney  (Sellar,  Roman  Poets 
of  the  Republic,  p.  382)  :  "  His  abundant  use  of  compound 
words,  .  .  .  most  of  which  fell  mto  disuse  in  the  Augus- 
tan age,  [was  a  product]  of  the  same  creative  force  which 
enabled  Plautus  and  Ennius  to  add  largely  to  the  resources 
of  the  Latin  tongue.  In  him,  more  than  in  any  Latin  poet 
before  or  after  him,  we  meet  with  phrases  too  full  of  imagi- 
native life  to  be  in  perfect  keeping  with  the  more  sober 
tones  and  tamer  spirit  of  the  national  Uterature." 

It  would  be  tedious  to  enumerate  the  specific  marks  of 
Sidney's  prose  as  exhibited  in  his  essay.  This  task  may 
well  be  reserved  for  those  who  undertake  a  systematic  study 
of  his  tractate  with  reference  to  the  illustration  of  rhetorical 
principles  or  historical  tendencies.    The  key  to  many  of  its 


INTR  OD  UC  TION. 


peculiarities  will,  however,  be  found  in  one  or  two  general 
considerations.  First  of  all,  Sidney's  may  be  called  an  emo- 
tional prose.  There  is  a  prose  of  light  only,  and  there  is 
another  of  light  and  heat  conjoined.  That  of  Sidney  belongs 
to  the  latter  class.  It  seeks  to  persuade,  and  is  in  that  sense 
oratorical ;  Hallam  even  calls  it  declamatory.  Yet  while 
in  its  argumentative  sequences  it  falls  under  the  head  of 
oratory,  in  its  procession  from  the  emotions  and  frequent 
appeal  to  them,  in  its  imagery  and  melodious  rhythm,  it  has 
something  in  common  with  poetry.  In  this  union  of  quali- 
ties will  be  found  alike  its  merits  and  its  defects. 

There  is  a  somewhat  different  point  of  view  from  which 
the  whole  may  be  regarded.  Though  the  author  of  the 
Defense  had  before  him  the  finished  prose  of  other  nations 
and  languages,  he  stood  at  the  formative  period  of  an  artis- 
tic prose  in  Enghsh,  and  the  conditions  under  which  all  men 
work  at  such  epochs  are  less  materially  affected  by  their 
acquaintance  with  existing  models  in  other  tongues  than 
may  at  first  thought  be  supposed.  They  know  and  perhaps 
approve  the  better,  but  instinctively  or  deliberately  follow 
the  worse ;  or,  in  the  absence  of  approved  precedent,  they 
attempt  to  fashion  an  organ  for  the  more  purely  intellectual 
faculties,  and  find  themselves  slipping  back  into  the  bal- 
anced constructions  and  regular  cadences  of  verse.  The 
era  of  the  English  Renaissance  has  in  this  respect  many 
points  of  resemblance  with  the  intellectual  awakening  of 
Greece  after  the  Persian  wars.  The  evolution  of  Greek 
prose  finds  its  counterpart  in  the  struggle  to  shape  a  literary 
medium  in  English  for  thought  too  purely  rational  and  utili- 
tarian in  its  character  to  be  fitly  couched  in  the  ornate  dic- 
tion and  measured  rhythms  of  poetry.  The  description  of 
the  former  by  an  accomplished  living  scholar  will  fairly 
characterize  the  stage  through  which  the  more  ambitious 
English  prose  was  at  this  time  passing  (Jebb,  Attic  Orators 
I.  1 8-2 1 )  :  **The  outburst  of  intellectual  life  in  Hellas 


INTR  OD  UCTION. 


xxvii 


during  the  fifth  century  before  Christ  had  for  one  of  its 
results  the  creation  of  Greek  prose.  Before  that  age  no 
Greek  had  conceived  artistic  composition  except  in  the  form 

of  poetry          As  the  mental  horizon  of  Greece  was  widened, 

as  subtler  ideas  and  more  various  combinations  began  to  ask 
for  closer  and  more  flexible  expression,  the  desire  grew  for 
something  more  precise  than  poetry,  firmer  and  more  com- 
pact than  the  idiom  of  conversation.  Two  special  causes 
aided  this  general  tendency.  The  development  of  demo- 
cratic life,  making  the  faculty  of  speech  before  popular 
assemblies  and  popular  law-courts  a  necessity,  hastened  the 
formation  of  an  oratorical  prose.  The  Persian  wars,  by 
changing  Hellenic  unity  from  a  sentiment  into  a  fact,  and 
reminding  men  that  there  was  a  corporate  life,  higher  and 
grander  than  that  of  the  individual  city,  of  which  the  story 
might  be  told,  supplied  a  new  motive  to  historical  prose.  .  .  . 
But  the  process  of  maturing  the  new  kind  of  composition 
was  necessarily  slow ;  for  it  required,  as  its  first  condition, 
little  less  than  the  creation  of  a  new  language,  of  an  idiom 
neither  poetical  nor  mean.  Herodotos,  at  the  middle  point 
of  the  fifth  century,  shows  the  poetical  element  still  prepon- 
derant. .  .  .  The  prose-writer  of  this  epoch  instinctively 
compares  himself  with  the  poet.  .  .  .  He  does  not  care  to 
be  simply  right  and  clear  :  rather  he  desires  to  have  the 
whole  advantage  which  his  skill  gives  him  over  ordinary 
men ;  he  is  eager  to  bring  his  thoughts  down  upon  them 
with  a  splendid  and  irresistible  force.  ...  At  the  moment 
when  prose  was  striving  to  disengage  itself  from  the  diction 
of  poetry,  Gorgias  gave  currency  to  the  notion  that  poetical 
ornament  of  the  most  florid  type  was  its  true  charm.  When, 
indeed,  he  went  further,  and  sought  to  imitate  the  rhythm 
as  well  as  the  phrase  of  poetry,  this  very  extravagance  had 
a  useful  result.  Prose  has  a  rhythm,  though  not  of  the  kind 
at  which  Gorgias  aimed ;  and  the  mere  fact  of  the  Greek 
ear  becommg  accustomed  to  look  for  a  certain  proportion 


xxviii 


INTRODUCTION, 


between  the  parts  of  a  sentence  hastened  the  transition 
from  the  old  running  style  to  the  periodic." 

Jebb  still  further  characterizes  the  Gorgian  manner  in  his 
Introduction,  pp.  cxxvi-cxxvii  :  "  That  which  was  to  the 
Athenians  .  .  .  the  element  of  distinction  in  the  Sicilian's 
speaking  was  its  poetical  character ;  and  this  depended  on 
two  things  —  the  use  of  poetical  words,  and  the  use  of  sym- 
metry or  assonance  between  clauses  in  such  a  way  as  to 
give  a  strongly  marked  prose-rhythm  and  to  reproduce,  as 
far  as  possible,  the  metres  of  verse.  .  .  .  Gorgias  was  the 
first  man  who  definitely  conceived  how  literary  prose  might 
be  artistic.  That  he  should  instinctively  compare  it  with 
the  only  other  form  of  literature  which  was  already  artistic, 
namely  poetry,  was  inevitable.  Early  prose  necessarily 
begins  by  comparing  itself  with  poetry." 

If  the  Euphuistic  and  Arcadian  prose  of  the  sixteenth 
century  be  read  in  the  light  of  this  account  of  the  Gorgian 
writing,  it  will  be  impossible  to  overlook  certain  points  of 
similarity,  and  equally  impossible  to  ignore  certain  resem- 
blances in  the  conditions  under  which  the  Greek  and  the 
Enghsh  prose  were  respectively  developed.  But  in  insti- 
tuting such  a  comparison,  there  are  important  differences 
which  must  not  be  disregarded,  though  there  is  no  space 
to  touch  upon  them  here.  And  whatever  conclusions  are 
reached  respecting  Euphuism  and  Arcadianism  must  cer- 
tainly undergo  modification  before  proving  applicable  to  the 
style  of  the  Defense, 

5.  Theory  of  Poetry. 

The  theory  of  poetry  advanced  by  Sidney  is,  in  its  essen- 
tials, the  oldest  of  which  we  have  any  knowledge,  so  old, 
indeed,  that  by  Sidney's  time  the  world  had  well-nigh  for- 
gotten it,  or  had  deliberately  chosen  to  ignore  it.  This 
theory  may  be  expressed  in  words  borrowed  from  Shelley's 
Defense  of  Poetry,  a  work  many  of  whose  chief  positions 


INTRODUCTION. 


xxix 


are  almost  precise  counterparts  of  those  assumed  by  Sidney  : 
"A  poet  participates  in  the  eternal,  the  infinite,  and  the 
one.  .  .  .  Poetry  in  a  more  restricted  sense  expresses  those 
arrangements  of  language,  and  especially  metrical  language, 
which  are  created  by  that  imperial  faculty  whose  throne  is 
curtained  within  the  invisible  nature  of  man.'*  Is  it  indeed 
true  that  these  words  represent  Sidney's  conception,  and, 
if  so,  how  is  this  conception  related  to  the  chief  rival 
theories  which  have  been,  or  were  then,  current?  This  is 
the  question  we  have  briefly  to  examine. 

Sidney  assumes  that  there  is  an  architectonic  science,  in 
this  following  the  lead  of  Aristotle,  who  in  his  Ethics  (see 
the  note  on  12  32  of  the  Deferise)  demands  this  rank  for 
what  he  calls  Political  Science,  but  what  we  are  accustomed 
to  term  Moral  Philosophy.  Speaking  as  an  ethnic,  Aristotle 
had  virtually  said  :  Above  all  other  learnings  stands  moral 
philosophy,  for  it  points  out  the  goal  of  all  wisely  directed 
human  effort."  Speaking  as  a  Christian,  Sidney  in  effect 
exclaims  :  Above  all  secular  learnings  stands  poetry,  for  it 
appropriates  the  purest  ethical  teaching,  and  presents  it  in 
a  form  universally  attractive  and  intensely  stimulating." 
Even  in  making  this  statement  Sidney  is  following  the  lead 
of  Aristotle,  who  had  thus  exalted  poetry  :  Poetry  is  of  a 
more  philosophical  and  serious  character  than  history  "  (see 
note  on  18  25).  Had  Aristotle  been  asked  to  determine 
the  relative  values  of  ethics,  poetry,  and  history  in  a 
descending  scale,  he  would  perhaps  have  hesitated  before 
giving  a  categorical  answer ;  had  he  been  urged,  he  would 
hardly  have  done  otherwise  than  arrange  them  in  the  order 
named.  Sidney's  reply  is  different.  He  practically  divides 
the  whole  of  ethics  into  religion  and  natural  ethics,  the 
latter  being  understood  as  moral  philosophy  unattended 
with  any  diviner  sanction  than  such  as  is  derived  from  the 
evident  nature  of  things  and  the  purest  intuitions  of  the 
human  spirit.    To  the  former  he  assigns  an  indisputable 


XXX 


INTRODUCTION. 


preeminence,  but  removes  it  from  the  province  of  discus- 
sion by  asserting  that  he  is  concerned  with  secular  learning 
only.  The  latter,  or  natural  ethics,  human  philosophy  as 
bearing  upon  the  conduct  of  life,  he  makes  distinctly  in- 
ferior to  poetry,  because,  unsupported  by  the  sanctions  of 
revealed  religion,  it  is  provided  with  no  adequate  motive 
force.  Such  a  motive  force  may,  however,  be  suppUed  by 
the  imaginative  presentation  of  the  respective  consequences 
of  good  and  evil  action,  but,  when  thus  suppUed,  it  converts 
philosophy  into  something  superior  to  philosophy  :  ethics 
has  become  poetry.  Thus  Homer  had  taught  the  whole 
Hellenic  race ;  thus  ^schylus  had  taught  the  Athenian 
democracy.  It  follows  that  every  creative  poet  —  for  it  is 
of  creative  poets  that  Sidney  is  speaking  —  must  be  in  a 
true  sense  a  philosopher,  though  it  is  by  no  means  true  that 
every  philosopher  is  necessarily  a  poet. 

We  may  now  return  to  our  point  of  departure  in  Shelley's 
definition.  '^A  poet,"  he  says,  "participates  in  the  eternal, 
the  infinite,  and  the  one."  But  may  we  not  with  equal 
truth  affirm  that  the  philosopher  participates  in  the  eternal, 
the  infinite,  and  the  one  ?  And  indeed  the  statement  thus 
far  is  true  of  both,  —  the  philosopher  and  the  creative  poet. 
Both,  under  the  veil  of  phenomena,  through  the  dim  glass 
of  appearance,  descry  the  pure  and  radiant  form  of  truth. 
To  the  vision  of  both  —  this  time  employing  the  beautiful 
words  of  Shelley  in  the  Adonais  — 

The  One  remains,  the  Many  change  and  pass; 
Heaven's  light  for  ever  shines,  Earth's  shadows  fly; 
Life,  like  a  dome  of  many-colored  glass, 
Stains  the  white  radiance  of  Eternity. 

What,  then,  is  the  difference  between  them?  It  is  this. 
When  the  philosopher  has  discovered  the  One  in  the  Many, 
the  principle  of  unity  embracing  the  variety  of  phenomena, 
he  must  pause,  or,  if  he  seem  to  proceed,  if  he  respond  to 


INTRODUCTION, 


xxxi 


the  urgent  desire  of  men  that  he  shall  furnish  them  with  a 
guide  to  life,  a  clue  through  the  tangled  maze  of  earthly 
vicissitude,  he  is  reduced  to  the  presentation  of  cold 
analyses,  or  the  bare  enunciation  of  a  moral  dictum,  a  cate- 
gorical imperative.  Not  so  the  poet.  He  also  affirms,  but 
he  likewise  stirs  the  feelings.  He  also  affirms,  but  the  form 
of  his  affirmation,  in  its  exquisite  blending  of  truth  with 
symbol,  in  its  representation  of  the  hidden  verity  by  a  cun- 
ning arrangement  of  the  lovely  shows  of  things,  delights 
every  sense  and  faculty  of  the  whole  being.  Poetry  thus 
actuahzes  what  in  philosophy  is  only  potential.  Philosophy 
is  a  Merlin,  but  a  Merlin  shut  away  from  the  world  in  a 
hollow  oak,  through  some  charm  of  woven  paces  and  of 
waving  hands  "  which  effectually  debars  it  from  exercising 
its  natural  prerogative,  the  ordering  of  human  lives  accord- 
ing to  the  eternal  idea  of  the  good,  the  necessary,  and  the 
true.  But  poetry  is  a  Prospero  whom  the  lightest  airs  of 
heaven  obey,  and  whose  empire  is  absolute  over  the  hearts 
and  consciences  of  men.  The  ugly  and  the  vicious  may 
grumble  at  its  dominion,  but  are  powerless,  are  even  half- 
won  to  reverence  for  the  viewless  might  by  which  they  are 
fettered;  while  all  gentle  spirits  rejoice  in  being  so  sweetly 
attuned  to  the  central  harmonies  of  Order  and  Law,  and  in 
finding  their  heedless  courses  wrought,  through  a  constrain- 
ing magic,  into  patterns  of  an  endless  and  most  felicitous 
beauty. 

We  can  thus  understand  how  Sidney  the  Puritan  was 
also  Sidney  the  poet,  and  how  religion  and  creative  poetry 
were  to  him  almost  as  sisters.  Both  assume  this  function  of 
guidance,  both  exercise  it  to  the  noblest  ends,  and  both 
achieve  their  purpose  through  the  kindling  of  the  imagina- 
tion and  an  appeal  to  the  emotional  nature.  The  one,  it  is 
true,  lays  direct  claim  to  a  divine  mission ;  the  other, 
though  conscious  of  its  divine*origin,  is  often  content  to  be 
regarded  merely  as  the  efflux  of  the  exalted  and  enraptured 


xxxii 


INTR  OD  UC  TION, 


human  soul.  But  is  there  not  a  point  where  the  two  coa- 
lesce? Who,  were  he  to  encounter  for  the  first  time  the 
following  passage  from  the  Phcedriis  of  Plato,  dissociated 
from  its  context,  could  tell  whether  the  author  w^as  speaking 
of  poetry  or  religion  —  or  perchance  of  philosophy  tinged 
with  emotion  ?  "  And  he  who  employs  aright  these  memories 
is  ever  being  initiated  into  perfect  mysteries  and  alone  be- 
comes truly  perfect.  But,  as  he  forgets  earthly  interests 
and  is  rapt  in  the  divine,  the  vulgar  deem  him  mad,  and 
rebuke  him  ;  they  do  not  see  that  he  is  inspired.  Thus  far 
I  have  been  speaking  of  the  fourth  and  last  kind  of  madness, 
w^hich  is  imputed  to  him  who,  when  he  sees  the  beauty  of 
earth,  is  transported  wdth  the  recollection  of  the  true  beauty ; 
he  would  like  to  fly  away,  but  he  cannot ;  he  is  like  a  bird 
fluttering  and  looking  upward  and  careless  of  the  world 
below;  and  he  is  therefore  esteemed  mad.  And  I  have 
shown  this  of  all  inspirations  to  be  the  noblest  and  highest 
and  the  offspring  of  the  highest"  (Jowett's  tr.,  2.  126). 
Or,  suppose  the  word  '  religion  *  to  be  substituted  for 
*  poetry '  in  these  sentences  from  Schiller's  Essay  on  Pathos 
(Hempel's  tr.,  2.  486),  and  note  whether  any  susceptibility 
is  shocked,  or  any  convictions  antagonized,  by  the  affirmations 
thus  made  :  "  In  the  case  of  man  poetry  never  executes  a 
special  business,  and  no  instrument  is  less  fitted  to  perform 
some  special  service.  Her  sphere  of  action  is  the  totahty 
of  human  nature ;  she  can  only  affect  single  traits  or  acts 
by  affecting  human  character  generally.  Poetry  may  be  to 
man  what  love  is  to  the  hero.  She  can  neither  advise  him, 
nor  fight  his  battles,  nor  perform  any  other  work  for  him ; 
but  she  may  educate  him  to  become  a  hero,  she  may  call 
him  to  perform  deeds,  she  may  arm  him  with  strength." 

Sidney's  theory  might  be  illustrated  by  the  practice  of  the 
more  illustrious  of  Dante's  contemporaries  and  thirteenth 
century  predecessors,  especially  by  that  of  such  poets  as 
Wolfram  von  Eschenbach  and  Guido  Guinicelli.    The  tech- 


INTR  ODUC  TION. 


xxxiii 


nic  invented  or  perfected  by  the  troubadours,  and  which 
they  had  employed  in  amatory,  satirical,  or  martial  compo- 
sitions, had  become,  in  the  course  of  time,  the  instrument 
of  philosophy.  A  definite  meaning  was  now  embodied  by 
the  poet  in  his  verse,  and  this  meaning  comprehended 
much  more  than  the  incidents  of  a  tale,  or  the  longing  for 
a  beloved  one.  It  was  not  exhausted  when  considered  as 
an  attack  upon  a  personal  enemy,  or  as  an  exhortation  to 
deeds  of  physical  valor.  Dante  himself,  alike  in  his  theory 
and  his  practice,  furnishes  the  most  convenient  exponent  of 
this  conception  of  poetry  as  the  teacher  and  guide  of  men, 
full  of  significance  when  apparently  most  sensuous,  intend- 
ing the  spiritual  and  transcendent  when  most  occupied  with 
colors,  and  odors,  and  sweet  sounds.  In  both  the  Neiv  Life 
and  the  Banquet  (^Convito)  Dante  gives  lengthy  exposi- 
tions of  a  few  poems,  revealing  by  analysis  the  fundamental 
truths  which  determined  the  structure  and  even  the  orna- 
ment of  each.  In  the  New  Life  (Rossetti's  tr.,  p.  8i)  he 
protests  against  meaningless  poetry  :  "  Neither  did  these 
ancient  poets  speak  thus  without  consideration,  nor  should 
they  who  are  makers  of  rime  in  our  day  write  after  the 
same  fashion,  having  no  reason  in  what  they  write  ;  for  it 
it  were  a  shameful  thing  if  one  should  rime  under  the  sem- 
blance of  metaphor  or  rhetorical  simihtude,  and  afterwards, 
being  questioned  thereof,  should  be  able  to  rid  his  words  of 
such  semblance,  unto  their  right  understanding.  Of  whom 
(to  wit,  of  such  as  rime  thus  foolishly)  myself  and  the 
first  among  my  friends  do  know  many."  And  in  his  Letter 
to  Can  Grande^  in  which  he  explains  the  scope  and  purport 
of  the  Divine  Comedy,  he  says  (Hillard's  tr.,  pp.  393,  396)  : 
"  There  are  six  things,  therefore,  that  must  be  sought  out  in 
beginning  any  instructive  work ;  that  is  to  say,  the  subject, 
the  agent,  the  forin,  the  end,  the  title  of  the  book,  and  the 
nature  of  its  philosophy.  .  .  .  Setting  aside  all  subtlety  of 
investigation,  we  may  say  briefly  that  the  end  of  both  (the 


xxxiv 


INTRODUCTION, 


whole  and  the  part)  is  to  rescue  those  who  hve  in  this  Hfe 
from  their  state  of  misery,  and  to  guide  them  to  the  state  of 
blessedness.  The  7iature  of  the  philosophy  governing  both 
the  whole  and  the  part  is  moral  action,  or  ethics^  because 
the  object  of  the  whole  work  is  not  speculative,  but  practi- 
cal. Therefore,  even  if  certain  places  or  passages  are 
treated  in  a  speculative  manner,  this  is  not  for  the  sake  of 
speculation,  but  of  operation."  The  substantial  identity  of 
Dante's  theory  of  poetry  with  that  of  Sidney,  will,  in  the 
light  of  these  and  similar  passages,  scarcely  be  questioned 
(cf.  54  2  ff.,  13  1  ff.). 

But  it  is  perhaps  more  obvious  to  compare  Sidney,  the 
Puritan  and  poet,  with  Milton,  the  Puritan  and  poet.  Does 
not  Milton  seem  to  be  reviving  the  memory  of  Sidney,  as 
well  as  tracing  an  ideal  for  himself,  in  the  well-known  pas- 
sage from  the  Apology  for  Smectymniius  :  I  was  confirmed 
in  this  opinion,  that  he  who  would  not  be  frustrate  of  his 
hope  to  write  well  hereafter  in  laudable  things  ought  him- 
self to  be  a  true  poem,  —  that  is,  a  composition  of  the  best 
and  honorablest  things ;  not  presuming  to  sing  high  praises 
of  heroic  men  or  famous  cities,  unless  he  have  in  himself 
the  experience  and  the  practice  of  all  that  which  is  praise- 
worthy." When  Sidney  says  of  the  poet,  "  For  he  doth  not 
only  show  the  way,  but  giveth  so  sweet  a  prospect  into  the 
way  as  will  entice  any  man  to  enter  into  it "  (see  23  i5  ff.), 
are  we  not  reminded  of  Milton's  words  in  the  Reason  of 
Church  Government:  Teaching  over  the  whole  book  of 
sanctity  and  virtue  through  all  the  instances  of  example, 
with  such  delight  —  to  those  especially  of  soft  and  delicious 
temper,  who  will  not  so  much  as  look  upon  truth  herself 
unless  they  see  her  elegantly  dressed  —  that,  whereas  the 
paths  of  honesty  and  good  life  appear  now  rugged  and  diffi- 
cult though  they  be  indeed  easy  and  pleasant,  they  will  then 
appear  to  all  men  both  easy  and  pleasant  though  they 
were  rugged  and  difficult  indeed."    Milton,  like  Sidney, 


• 


INTRODUCTION. 


XXXV 


had  a  keen  aesthetic  appreciation  of  the  poetical  parts  of 
the  Bible,  as  appears  from  his  estimate  of  the  Song  of 
Solomon  and  the  Book  of  Revelation,  concluding  with  the 
following  words  {^Reason  of  Church  Governme?it)  :  "  But 
those  frequent  songs  throughout  the  law  and  prophets  be- 
yond all  these,  not  in  their  divine  argument  alone,  but  in 
the  very  critical  art  of  composition,  may  be  easily  made 
appear  over  all  the  kinds  of  lyric  poesy  to  be  incompar- 
able "  (see  6  3  ff.,  9  19  ff.).  And  Milton,  like  Sidney,  in- 
veighs against  those  who  persist  in  writing  verse  while  still 
ignorant  of  the  first  principles  of  poetry  conceived  as  an 
ethical  force,  or  rather  while  dehberately  inculcating  the 
negation  of  all  principle,  and  abandonment  to  the  seduc- 
tions of  vice.  Thus  again  in  the  Reason  of  Church  Gov- 
er?ime?it,  Milton  denounces  the  writings  and  interludes  of 
libidinous  and  ignorant  poetasters,  who,  having  scarce  ever 
heard  of  that  which  is  the  main  consistence  of  a  true  poem, 
the  choice  of  such  persons  as  they  ought  to  introduce,  and 
what  is  moral  and  decent  to  each  one,  do  for  the  most  part 
lay  up  vicious  principles  in  sweet  pills  to  be  swallowed  down, 
and  make  the  taste  of  virtuous  documents  harsh  and  sour  " 
(cf.  45  20  ff.,  23  20  ff.). 

These  comparisons  illustrate  the  consensus  of  opinion 
among  men  of  different  centuries,  but  substantially  equal 
endowments,  with  respect  to  the  ethical  function  of  the 
highest  creative  poetry,  and  its  kinship  with  religion.  It 
can  hardly  be  necessary  to  provide  further  proof  that  Sid- 
ney's position  is  not  only  defensible,  but  inexpugnable.  As 
he  himself  says,  poetry  may  be  perverted  and  turned  from 
its  rightful  use  ;  but  this  being  true  of  every  most  excellent 
thing,  we  should  not  allow  ourselves  to  be  prejudiced  by 
the  fact  of  such  abuse,  otherwise,  if  we  are  logical,  we  shall 
approve  of  nothing,  however  blameless  and  salutary  in  its 
unpolluted  state. 


xxxvi 


INTR  OD  UCTION, 


Sidney  owes  much  to  Plato,  but  still  more  to  Aristotle. 
Plato,  in  his  joy  over  the  new-found  virtues  of  philosophy, 
was  scarcely  capable  of  recognizing  poetry  as  a  coordinate, 
much  less  a  superior,  power.  He  demanded  a  purer  ethics 
as  the  guide  of  life  than  any  which  he  found  in  the  poetry 
then  extant.  That  it  taught  moral  lessons  he  could  not 
deny ;  but  it  was  neither  free  from  imperfections,  nor  did 
it  contain,  in  his  view,  any  sufficient  self-regenerative  or  self- 
purifying  principle.  This  must  be  supplied  by  philosophy. 
Failing  to  perceive  that  his  own  philosophy  was  merely  a 
phase  of  poetry,  dependent  like  poetry  upon  undemonstra- 
ble  intuitions  for  its  beauty  and  efficacy,  he  endeavored  to 
sunder  them  by  artificial  distinctions,  though  such  as  must 
have  had  a  certain  validity  to  his  own  mind.  But  in  the 
very  act  of  dethroning  poetry  he  gave  it  a  new  title  to 
dominion.  The  spoils  with  which  he  endowed  philosophy 
returned  by  inheritance  to  her  elder  sister  and  rival.  Pla- 
tonism  became  the  intellectual  ally  of  Christianity,  and 
Christianity  generated  a  new  poetry.  Nay,  Platonism  itself 
reappeared  in  the  intellectual  awakening  of  modern  Europe 
as  the  quickening  impulse,  in  some  instances  as  the  very 
soul,  of  Italian  and  Enghsh  poetry.  Who  can  measure 
Michael  Angelo's  debt  to  Plato,  or  Spenser's  ?  In  this 
debt  Sidney  shared,  as  his  allusions  clearly  show.  As  Spen- 
ser would  not  have  been  the  poet  we  know,  had  he  been 
deprived  of  the  influence  of  Plato,  so  neither  would  Sidney 
have  been  the  essayist  we  know,  had  he  not  read  and  reread 
the  burning  pages  where  poetry  strives  to  masquerade  as 
philosophy,  and  betrays,  by  the  very  rhythm  of  her  move- 
ments, her  incapacity  to  keep  the  sober  pace  of  reasoning 
prose.  But  as  the  framework  of  the  Fairy  Queen  depends 
upon  Aristotle's  classification  of  the  virtues,  so  the  frame- 
work of  the  Defense  of  Poetry^  or  at  least  of  its  central  and 
most  important  division,  depends  upon  the  opening  para- 


INTRODUCTION. 


xxxvii 


graphs  of  Aristotle's  Ethics  and  a  few  sentences  from  his 
Poetics, 

That  there  is  a  branch  of  learning  sovran  over  all  the  rest, 
that  poetry  is  superior  to  history,  and  that  poetry  contains  a 
philosophic  element,  —  such  were  the  cardinal  truths  which 
Sidney  learned  from  Aristotle.  From  these  premises  Sidney 
deduced  that,  as  poetry  superadds  a  peculiar  attractiveness 
to  the  philosophic  element  it  embodies,  it  must  in  its  effects 
be  superior  to  philosophy,  as  it  is,  by  the  demonstration  of 
Aristotle,  to  history,  and  that  it  must  accordingly  be  entitled 
to  the  highest  rank  among  secular  learnings.  This  being 
granted,  the  further  course  of  his  main  argument  follows  in 
natural  sequence. 

Sidney  was  not  unacquainted  with  Dante,  and  there  are 
even  reasons  for  supposing  that  he  may  have  perused  one 
or  more  of  Dante's  prose  treatises.  If  the  evidence  derived 
from  the  quotations  from  Dante  on  a  preceding  page  is  re- 
garded as  slight,  this  may  be  supplemented  by  other  con- 
siderations. In  his  Co7ivito,  which  is  largely  based  upon 
Aristotle's  Ethics,  Dante,  like  Sidney,  enters  into  a  defense 
of  his  mother-tongue.  Sidney,  near  the  close  of  his  argu- 
ment, supplements  this  defense  of  English  with  a  discussion 
of  its  prosody,  apparently  following  the  example  of  Dante  in 
his  De  Viclgari  Eloquio,  Even  more  curious  is  the  circum- 
stance that  Dante  attributes  the  same  two  senses  to  the 
word  ^rime'  as  does  Sidney  (see  note  on  56  17).  In  the 
Convito  (Hillard's  tr.,  p.  233),  Dante  thus  distinguishes 
between  these  senses :  Strictly  speaking,  it  [i.e.  rime] 
means  that  correspondence  of  the  ultimate  and  penultimate 
syllables  which  it  is  customary  to  use  ;  generally  speaking, 
it  means  any  speech  which,  regulated  by  number  and  time, 
falls  into  rhythmic  consonance."  These  correspondences 
will  hardly  be  thought  accidental,  and  must  incline  us  to  the 
beUef  that  Sidney  had  Dante's  prose  writing  in  mind  in 
composing  his  own  treatise.    The  improbability  that  two 


xxxviii 


IN  TR  OD  U  C  TION. 


authors,  one  in  Italian  and  the  other  in  English,  should  in- 
dependently arrive,  in  the  treatment  of  themes  then  so  novel 
in  their  respective  tongues,  at  so  similar  a  mode  of  intro- 
ducing the  same  subsidiary  topics,  is  too  evident  to  require 
comment. 

Grosart,  in  his  edition  of  Spenser,  suggests  that  Sidney 
may  have  utilized  Spenser's  unpublished  treatise,  Hie  Eng- 
lish Poet  Thus  he  says  (i.  99)  :  If  not  bodily,  yet  largely, 
I  like  to  think  that  we  have  The  Eiiglishe  Poet  utilized  at 
least  in  Sidney's  Apology  or  Defense  of  Poetry,  It  is  also 
to  be  remembered  it  was  posthumously  pubhshed."  And 
again  (i.  453-4)  :  I  may  be  wrong,  but  I  have  a  soup- 
^on  of  suspicion  that  if  Sir  Philip  Sidney  had  lived  to  have 
published  his  Defense  of  Poesy  himself,  there  vv^ould  have 
been  an  acknowledgment  of  indebtedness  to  Spenser  in 
its  composition.  Is  it  utterly  improbable  —  as  I  ventured 
earlier  to  suggest  —  that  Sir  Philip  should  have  incorporated 
or  adapted  the  English  Poet  of  Spenser  in  his  Defense?  I 
trow  not.  Only  thus  can  I  understand  its  suppression  when 
'  finished  '  and  ready  for  the  press."  Since  we  know  nothing 
of  the  contents  of  Spenser's  work,  this  surmise  is  incapable 
of  confirmation,  and  the  question  thus  raised  must  for  ever 
remain  indeterminable. 

To  sum  up  our  chief  results,  Sidney's  fundamental  doc- 
trine is  true  of  the  highest  creative  poetry,  and  in  general 
of  the  noblest  literature  produced  by  the  creative  imagina- 
tion, whether  executed  in  verse  or  prose.  This  doctrine  is 
founded  upon  Aristotle's  teaching,  and  leavened  with  the 
best  of  Plato's  spirit,  as  interpreted  and  supplemented  by 
Christianity  and  the  literature  produced  under  Christian 
influence.  Of  the  latter  Dante  was  probably  recognized 
by  Sidney  as  the  foremost  representative,  and  he  may  thus 
have  come  to  be  accepted  as  Sidney's  guide  in  the  concep- 
tion and  arrangement  of  some  of  the  minor  topics  of  the 
Defense,    Finally,  his  threefold  division  of  poetry  is  taken 


INTR  OB  UC  TION. 


xxxix 


from  Scaliger's  Poetics  (see  note  on  9  27).  A  reference 
to  the  Analysis  (p.  xli  ff.)  will  suffice  to  show  the  nature  and 
extent  of  Sidney's  originality,  after  allowance  has  been  made 
for  his  borrowings  from  predecessors. 

6.  Followers  and  Imitators. 

Sidney's  Defense  must  have  been  extensively  circulated 
in  manuscript  before  its  publication  in  1595.  Extensive 
quotations  from  it  are  found  in  Puttenham's  Aj't  of  English 
Poesy,  published  in  1589  ;  in  Harington's  Apology  of  Poetiy^ 
prefixed  to  the  first  edition  of  his  translation  of  the  O^^lando 
Finioso,  and  pubUshed  in  1591  ;  and  in  Meres'  Palladis 
Tamia,  1598.  These  have  all  been  reprinted  in  Hasle- 
wood's  Critical  Essays  upon  English  Poets  and  Poesy,  Lon- 
don, 2  vols.,  the  first  volume  bearing  date  of  181 1,  the  second 
of  1 815.  This  edition  is  the  one  which  has  been  cited  in  the 
notes  to  the  present  volume.  Harington  is  outspoken  with 
regard  to  his  knowledge  of  Sidney  (Haslewood,  2.  123)  : 
^'  For  as  for  all,  or  the  most  part,  of  such  questions,  I  will 
refer  you  to  Sir  Philip  Sidney's  Apologv,  who  doth  handle 
them  right  learnedly."  The  obligations  of  the  others,  how- 
ever, are  no  less  evident,  and  it  is  instructive  to  observe 
how  Meres  makes  literal  excerpts  from  Sidney,  while  Put- 
tenham  now  adopts  his  method  of  treatment,  and  now  em- 
ploys his  illustrations,  or  slightly  varies  his  phraseology. 

Among  moderns  it  is  difficult  to  beheve  that  Shelley  was 
ignorant  of  Sidney's  tractate,  though  the  similarities  of  opin- 
ion may  be  due  to  familiarity  with  common  sources  in  Plato 
and  Aristotle,  or  to  the  deeper  insight  of  which  genius  alone 
is  capable.  As  to  modern  imitations  in  general,  it  will  suf- 
fice to  quote  from  the  essay  on  the  Defense  in  Vol.  10  of 
the  Retrospective  Revieinj,  published  in  1824:  "Should  it 
occur  to  the  reader,  in  the  midst  of  his  admiration  of  these 
passages,  that  he  has  met  with  something  like  parts  of  them 


xl 


INTRODUCTION. 


before,  we  can  readily  believe  that  he  is  not  mistaken ;  for 
the  truth  is,  that  the  Defense  of  Poesy  has  formed  the  staple 
of  all  the  '  thousand  and  one  '  dissertations  on  that  art,  with 
which  our  magazines  and  reviews  have  teemed  during  the 
last  twenty  years." 


ANALYSIS. 


Introduction.    Anecdote  of  Pugliano,  and  transition  to  subject  proper, 
1 1-2  17. 

I.  Poetry  the  earliest  of  teachers,  2  18—5  7. 

A.  Philosophy  a  borrower  from  poetry,  3  16—4  4. 

B.  History  a  borrower  from  poetry,  4  5-15. 

C.  The  rudest  and  most  untutored  nations  not  without  poetry, 

4  16—5  7. 

II.  Honorable  names  bestowed  upon  the  poet,  5  8—9  5. 

A.  The  Romans  called  him  a  prophet  or  seer,  5  12—6  2. 

B.  David  should  accordingly  be  ranked  as  a  poet,  6  3-26. 

C.  The  Greeks  called  the  poet  a  maker,  6  27-33. 

D.  This  title  rightfully  belongs  to  him,  6  33—9  5. 

1.  Other  arts  are  cherished  as  the  handmaids  of  nature  and 

compendiums  of  the  rules  she  observes,  6  33—  7  25. 

2.  The  poet  creates  a  second  nature,  devising  it  after  an 

archetypal  pattern  in  his  mind,  7  26—9  5. 

a.  He  creates  the  external  world  anew,  7  34—8  4. 

b.  He  creates  man  anew,  8  5-25. 

c.  His  relation  to  the  Heavenly  Maker,  8  25—9  5, 

III.  The  definition  and  divisions  of  poetry,  9  6—11  31. 

A.  Definition,  9  12-16. 

B.  First  division :  Hymns  and  Religious  Odes,  Hebrew  and  eth- 

nic, 9  17-33. 

C.  Second  division :  Didactic  Poetry,  9  34—10  5. 

D.  Third  division :  Creative  Poetry,  or  Poetry  in  the  strictest  and 

truest  sense,  10  6-35. 

E.  Subdivisions  of  poetry,  11  1-4. 

F.  Verse  not  essential  to  poetry,  11  4-25. 

G.  Verse  the  fittest  raiment  of  poetry,  11  25-31. 


xlii 


ANAL  YSIS. 


IV.  Creative  Poetry  examined  with  reference  to  its  rank  and  virtue, 
11  32-31  17. 

A.  Creative  Poetry  in  general  as  the  guide  and  inspiration  to  the 
supreme  end  of  earthly  learning,  virtuous  action,  11  32—2611. 

1.  The  Chief  or  Architectonic  Science,  and  its  relation  to  the 
subordinate  sciences,  12  1—13  5. 

2.  Consideration  of  the  claims  of  the  three  principal  competi- 

tors for  the  title  of  Architectonic  Science,  namely, 
(Moral)  Philosophy,  History,  and  Poetry,  and  award 
of  the  preeminence  to  Poetry,  13  6—26  11. 

a.  Pretensions  of  Philosophy,  13  6-26. 

b.  Pretensions  of  History,  13  27—14  23. 

c.  Poetry  confessedly  inferior  to  Divinity,  but  far  superior 

to  Law,  both  of  which  may  therefore  be  eliminated 
from  the  discussion,  14  24—15  14. 

d.  Philosophy  has  only  the  precept.  History  only  the  ex- 

ample, 15  15-30. 

e.  Poetry  superior  to  Philosophy,  since  it  embodies  the 

philosopher's  precept  in  an  example,  the  abstract 
principle  in  a  concrete  illustration,  15  31 — 16  22. 

f.  Examples  from  secular  poets,  16  23—17  31,  and  from 

the  parables  of  Christ,  17  32— IS  10,  of  the  power 
of  Poetry  as  compared  with  that  of  Philosophy, 
16  23—18  10. 

g.  Philosophy  abstruse,  Poetry  intelligible  to  all,  18  11-19. 

h.  Poetry  more  philosophical  than  History,  because  more 

universal  in  its  content,  1 8  20 — 19  2. 

i.  Record  of  fact  to  be  distinguished  from  guidance  of 

life,  19  3-7. 

j.  The  heroes  of  Plistory,  unlike  those  of  Poetry,  cannot 

be  accepted  as  models,  19  18—20  7. 
k.  The  tales  imagined  by  Poetry  are  no  less  instructive 

than  those  related  by  History,  are  indeed  more 

effective,  20  8-28. 
/.   Poetry  shapes  the  raw  material  furnished  by  History, 

20  29-21  3. 

m.  Poetry,  not  History,  is  the  due  rewarder  of  virtue  and 

punisher  of  vice,  21  4—22  6. 
n.  Poetry,  unlike  History,  and  especially  Philosophy,  not 

only  instructs,  but  stimulates  and  impels,  providing 

incentives  to  learning  as  well  as  the  learning  itself, 

22  7-25  2. 


ANAL  YSIS, 


xliii 


0.  Two  examples  of  the  powerful  effects  produced  by 

poetically  devised  tales,  25  3—26  2. 
^.  Poetry  is  therefore  the  noblest  of  all  secular  learnings, 
26  3-11. 

B.  The  subdivisions  of  Creative  Poetry  with  reference  to  their 
several  virtues,  2612—31  17. 

1.  Mixed  species  may  be  disregarded,  26  19-30. 

2.  The  pastoral,  26  31—27  11. ' 

3.  The  elegiac,  27  12-18. 

4.  The  iambic,  27  19-21. 

5.  The  satiric,  27  22-30. 

6.  Comedy,  27  31—28  24. 

7.  Tragedy,  28  25-29  13. 

8.  The  lyric,  29  14-30  11. 

9.  The  epic,  3012-31 17. 

V.  First  Summary,  of  arguments  adduced,  31  18—32  7. 

VI.  Objections  against  Poetry,  and  refutation  of  them,  32  8—44  2. 

A.  Minor  considerations,  32  14—34  23. 

1.  Sophistical  tricks  to  obscure  the  point  at  issue,  32  14—33  9. 

2.  Reply  to  the  objections  brought  against  rime  and  metre, 

33  10-34  23. 

a.  Rime  and  metre  the  musical  framework  of  perfect 

speech,  33  lG-24. 

b.  Rime  and  metre  the  best  aids  to  memory,  33  28—34  23. 

B.  The  cardinal  objections  and  the  answers  to  each,  34  24—44  2. 

1.  The  four  objections,  34  24—3  5  8. 

a.  Other  knowledges  more  fruitful,  34  2G-29. 

b.  Poetry  the  parent  of  lies,  34  30. 

c.  Poetry  the  nurse  of  abuse,  34  31—35  4. 

d.  Plato  condemned  poetry,  35  5-8. 

2.  The  objections  answered,  35  9—44  2. 

a.  Refutation  of  first.    Previous  proof  adduced,  35  9-20. 

b.  Refutation  of  second.     Impossibility  demonstrated, 

35  21-37  7. 

c.  Refutation  of  third,  3  7  8— 40  32. 

aa.  Abuse  no  argument  against  right  use,  37  8-28. 
bb.  Poetry  not  incompatible  with  action  and  martial 
courage,  3  7  29—40  32. 

d.  Refutation  of  fourth,  40  33—44  2. 

aa.  Sidney's  reverence  for  Plato,  40  33—41  4, 


xliv 


ANALYSIS, 


bb.  As  a  philosopher,  Plato  might  be  thought  a 
natural  enemy  of  poets,  41  5-26. 

cc.  The  morals  he  taught  by  no  means  superior  to 
those  inculcated  by  the  poets,  41  26—42  3. 

dd.  But  Plato  meant  to  condemn  only  the  abuse  of 
poetry,  not  the  thing  itself,  42  3-10. 

ee.  Plato  would  have  had  a  purer  religion  taught, 
but  this  objection  has  been  removed  by  the 
advent  of  Christianity,  42  10—43  1. 

ff.  Plato  goes  further  than  Sidney  himself,  in  making 
poetry  depend  on  a  divine  inspiration,  43  1-15. 

gg.  The  multitude  of  great  men,  Socrates  and  Aris- 
totle included,  who  have  countenanced  poe- 
try, 43  16—44  2. 

VII.  Second  Summary,  of  objections  refuted,  44  3-13. 

VTII.  The  state  of  English  poetry,  44  14—55  20. 

A.  Poetry,  anciently  and  latterly  held  in  estimation  in  other 

countries,  and  formerly  even  in  England,  is  now  despised, 
44  14—45  20. 

B.  Hence  only  base  men  undertake  it,  45  20—46  2. 

C.  Poetry  not  to  be  learned  and  practised  as  a  trade,  46  3—47  5. 

D.  Estimates  of  English  poetry,  with  respect  to  matter  (and  com- 

position in  general),  47  6—5  1  32. 

1.  Chaucer,  Sackville,  Surrey,  and  Spenser  praised  with  mod- 

eration, Sidney  not  ranking  himself  with  poets  (cf. 
46  8-11,  55  6-10),  47  6-27. 

2.  Defects  of  the  English  drama,  47  28—52  10. 

a.  Disregards  unity  of  place,  48  11-25. 

b.  Disregards  unity  of  time,  48  26—49 18. 

c.  Disregards  unity  of  action,  49  19—50  2. 

d.  Mingles  tragedy  and  comedy,  50  3-22. 

e.  Broad  farce  usurps  the  place  of  comedy,  50  23—52  4. 

3.  The  lyric,  which  might  well  sing  the  Divine  beauty  and 

goodness  (5212-19),  is  frigid  and  affected  in  celebrat- 
ing human  love,  52  11-32. 

E.  English  poetry  with  respect  to  diction,  52  33—56  35. 

1.  Affectations  in  diction,  52  33—53  6. 

2.  Excursus  upon  euphuism  in  prose,  53  7—55  10. 

a.  The  excessive  employment  of  phrases  and  figures  bor- 
rowed from  the  ancients,  53  10—54  4. 


ANALYSIS, 


xlv 


b.  Superabundance  of  similes,  especially  of  such  as  are 

drawn  from  the  animal  and  vegetable  kingdoms, 
54  5-15. 

c.  The  means  should  not  be  suffered  to  obscure  the  end, 

54  16-35. 

d.  Apology  for  the  digression,  55  I-IO. 

3.  The  English  language  favorable  to  poetry,  55  10—56  35. 

a.  Equal  to  all  demands  upon  it,  55  10-12. 

b.  Its  composite  nature  an  advantage,  55  13-15. 

c.  The  grammarless  tongue,  55  15-22. 

d.  Its  compound  words,  55  22-27. 

4.  English  versification  the  best  for  modern  poetry,  55  28— 

56  35. 

a.  Ancient  and  modern  versification,  55  28—56  7. 

b.  English  best  adapted  to  modern  metre,  56  7-22. 

c.  And  to  riming,  56  23-35. 

IX.  Third  Summary.    General  review,  57  1-27. 


Humorous  peroration,  5  7  28—58  16. 


THE  DEFENSE  OF  POESY. 


When  the  right  virtuous  Edward  Wotton  aud  I  were  at 
the  Emperor's  court  together,  we  gave  ourselves  to  learn 
horsemanship  of  John  Pietro  PugUano,  one  that  with 
great  commendation  had  the  place  of  an  esquire  in  his 
stable  ;  and  he,  according  to  the  fertileness  of  the  Italian 
wit,  did  not  only  afford  us  the  demonstration  of  his  prac- 
tice, but  sought  to  enrich  our  minds  with  the  contempla- 
tions therein  which  he  thought  most  precious.  But  with 
none  I  remember  mine  ears  were  at  any  time  more 
loaden,  than  when  —  either  angered  with  slow  payment, 
or  moved  with  our  learner-like  admiration  —  he  exercised 
his  speech  in  the  praise  of  his  faculty.  He  said  soldiers 
were  the  noblest  estate  of  mankind,  and  horsemen  the 
noblest  of  soldiers.  He  said  they  were  the  masters  of 
war  and  ornaments  of  peace,  speedy  goers  and  strong 
abiders,  triumphers  both  in  camps  and  courts.  Nay,  to 
so  unbelieved  a  point  he  proceeded,  as  that  no  earthly 
thing  bred  such  wonder  to  a  prince  as  to  be  a  good 
horseman ;  skill  of  government  was  but  a  pedanteria  in 
comparison.  Then  would  he  add  certain  praises,  by  tell- 
ing what  a  peerless  beast  the  horse  was,  the  only  service- 
able courtier  without  flattery,  the  beast  of  most  beauty, 
faithfulness,  courage,  and  such  more,  that  if  I  had  not 
been  a  piece  of  a  logician  before  I  came  to  him,  I  think 
he  would  have  persuaded  me  to  have  wished  myself  a 
horse.  But  thus  much  at  least  with  his  no  few  words  he 
drave  into  me,  that  self-love  is  better  than  any  gilding  to 
make  that  seem  gorgeous  wherein  ourselves  be  parties. 


2  POETS  THE  EARLIEST  TEACHERS. 


Wherein  if  Pugliano'S  strong  affection  and  weak  argu- 
ments will  not  satisfy  you,  I  will  give  you  a  nearer  ex- 
ample of  myself,  who,  I  know  not  by  what  mischance,  in 
these  my  not  old  years  and  idlest  times,  having  slipped 

5  into  the  title  of  a  poet,  am  provoked  to  say  something 
unto  you  in  the  defense  of  that  my  unelected  vocation, 
which  if  I  handle  with  more  good  will  than  good  reasons, 
bear  with  me,  since  the  scholar  is  to  be  pardoned  that 
followeth  the  steps  of  his  master.    And  yet  I  must  say 

lo  that,  as  I  have  just  cause  to  make  a  pitiful  defense  of 
poor  poetry,  which  from  almost  the  highest  estimation  of 
learning  is  fallen  to  be  the  laughing-stock  of  children, 
so  have  I  need  to  bring  some  more  available  proofs,  since 
the  former  is  by  no  man  barred  of  his  deserved  credit, 

15  the  silly  latter  hath  had  even  the  names  of  philosophers 
used  to  the  defacing  of  it,  with  great  danger  of  civil  war 
among  the  Muses. 

And  first,  truly,  to  all  them  that,  professing  learning, 
inveigh  against  poetry,  may  justly  be  objected  that  they 

20  go  very  near  to  ungratefulness,  to  seek  to  deface  that 
which,  in  the  noblest  nations  and  languages  that  are 
known,  hath  been  the  first  light-giver  to  ignorance,  and 
first  nurse,  whose  milk  by  Httle  and  little  enabled  them 
to  feed  afterwards  of  tougher  knowledges.    And  will  they 

25  now  play  the  hedgehog,  that,  being  received  into  the 
den,  drave  out  his  host  ?  Or  rather  the  vipers,  that  with 
their  birth  kill  their  parents  ?  Let  learned  Greece  in  any 
of  her  manifold  sciences  be  able  to  show  me  one  book 
before  Musaeus,  Homer,  and  Hesiod,  all  three  nothing 

30  else  but  poets.  Nay,  let  any  history  be  brought  that  can 
say  any  writers  were  there  before  them,  if  they  were  not 
men  of  the  same  skill,  as.  Orpheus,  Linus,  and  some  other 
are  named,  who,  having  been  the  first  of  that  country 
that  made  pens  deliverers  of  their  knowledge  to  their 

35  posterity,  may  justly  challenge  to  be  called  their  fathers 


POETS  THE  FIRST  PHILOSOPHERS. 


3 


in  learning.  For  not  only  in  time  they  had  this  priority 
—  although  in  itself  antiquity  be  venerable  —  but  went 
before  them  as  causes,  to  draw  with  their  charming  sweet- 
ness the  wild  untamed  wits  to  an  admiration  of  knowl- 
edge. So  as  Amphion  was  said  to  move  stones  with  his  5 
poetry  to  build  Thebes,  and  Orpheus  to  be  Hstened  to  by 
beasts,  —  indeed  stony  and  beastly  people.  So  among 
the  Romans  were  Livius  Andronicus  and  Ennius ;  so  in 
the  Italian  language  the  first  that  made  it  aspire  to  be  a 
treasure-house  of  science  were  the  poets  Dante,  Boccace,  10 
and  Petrarch ;  so  in  our  English  were  Gower  and 
Chaucer,  after  whom,  encouraged  and  delighted  with 
their  excellent  foregoing,  others  have  followed  to  beautify 
our  mother-tongue,  as  well  in  the  same  kind  as  in  other 
arts.  15 

This  did  so  notably  show  itself,  that  the  philosophers 
of  Greece  durst  not  a  long  time  appear  to  the  world  but 
under  the  masks  of  poets.  So  Thales,  Empedocles,  and 
Parmenides  sang  their  natural  philosophy  in  verses  ;  so 
did  Pythagoras  and  Phocyhdes  their  moral  counsels ;  so  20 
did  Tyrtseus  in  war  matters,  and  Solon  in  matters  of 
policy ;  or  rather  they,  being  poets,  did  exercise  their 
delightful  vein  in  those  points  of  highest  knowledge 
which  before  them  lay  hidden  to  the  world.  For  that 
wise  Solon  was  directly  a  poet  it  is  manifest,  having  25 
written  in  verse  the  notable  fjble  of  the  Atlantic  Island 
which  was  continued  by  Plato.  And  truly  even  Plato 
whosoever  well  considereth,  shall  find  that  in  the  body 
of  his  work  though  the  inside  and  strength  were  phi- 
losophy, the  skin  as  it  were  and  beauty  depended  most  30 
of  poetry.  For  all  standeth  upon  dialogues  ;  wherein  he 
feigneth  many  honest  burgesses  of  Athens  to  speak  of 
such  matters  that,  if  they  had  been  set  on  the  rack,  they 
would  never  have  confessed  them ;  besides  his  poetical 
describing  the  circumstances  of  their  meetings,  as  the  35 


4 


E  VER  V  CO  UNTR  V  HA  TH  ITS  FOE  TS. 


well-ordering  of  a  banquet,  the  delicacy  of  a  walk,  with 
interlacing  mere  tales,  as  Gyges'  Ring  and  others,  which 
who  knoweth  not  to  be  flowers  of  poetry  did  never  walk 
into  Apollo's  garden. 

5  And  even  historiographers,  although  their  hps  sound 
of  things  done,  and  verity  be  written  in  their  foreheads, 
have  been  glad  to  borrow  both  fashion  and  perchance 
weight  of  the  poets.  So  Herodotus  entituled  his  history 
by  the  name  of  the  nine  Muses ;  and  both  he  and  all 

lo  the  rest  that  followed  him  either  stole  or  usurped  of 
poetry  their  passionate  describing  of"  passions,  the  many 
particularities  of  battles  which  no  man  could  affirm,  or, 
if  that  be  denied  me,  long  orations  put  in  the  mouths 
of  great  kings  and  captains,  which  it  is  certain  they 

15  never  pronounced. 

So  that  truly  neither  philosopher  nor  historiographer 
could  at  the  first  have  entered  into  the  gates  of  popular 
judgments,  if  they  had  not  taken  a  great  passport  of 
poetry,  which  in  all  nations  at  this  day,  where  learning 

20  flourisheth  not,  is  plain  to  be  seen ;  in  all  which  they 
have  some  feeling  of  poetry.  In  Turkey,  besides  their 
lawgiving  divines  they  have  no  other  writers  but  poets. 
In  our  neighbor  country  Ireland,  where  truly  learning 
goeth  very  bare,  yet  are  their  poets  held  in  a  devout 

25  reverence.  Even  among  the  most  barbarous  and  simple 
Indians,  where  no  writing  is,  yet  have  they  their  poets, 
who  make  and  sing  songs  (which  they  call  arey/os),  both 
of  their  ancestors'  deeds  and  praises  of  their  gods,  —  a 
sufficient  probability  that,  if  ever  learning  come  among 

30  them,  it  must  be  by  having  their  hard  dull  wits  softened 
and  sharpened  with  the  sweet  delights  of  poetry;  for 
until  they  find  a  pleasure  in  the  exercise  of  the  mind, 
great  promises  of  much  knowledge  will  little  persuade 
them  that  know  not  the  fruits  of  knowledge.    In  Wales, 

35  the  true  remnant  of  the  ancient  Britons,  as  there  are 


THE  ROMANS  CALLED  POETS  PROP/LETS.  5 


good  authorities  to  show  the  long  time  they  had  poets 
which  they  called  bards,  so  through  all  the  conquests 
of  Romans,  Saxons,  Danes,  and  Normans,  some  of  whom 
did  seek  to  ruin  all  memory  of  learning  from  among 
them,  yet  do  their  poets  even  to  this  day  last ;  so  as  it  5 
is  not  more  notable  in  soon  beginning,  than  in  long  con- 
tinuing. 

But  since  the  authors  of  most  of  our  sciences  were 
the  Romans,  and  before  them  the  Greeks,  let  us  a  little 
stand  upon  their  authorities,  but  even  so  far  as  to  see  10 
what  names  they  have  given  unto  this  now  scorned  skill. 
Among  the  Romans  a  poet  was  called  vates,  which  is  as 
much  as  a  diviner,  foreseer,  or  prophet,  as  by  his  con- 
joined words,  vaticinium  and  vaticinari,  is  manifest ; 
so  heavenly  a  title  did  that  excellent  people  bestow  upon  15 
this  heart-ravishing  knowledge.  And  so  far  were  they 
carried  into  the  admiration  thereof,  that  they  thought  in 
the  chanceable  hitting  upon  any  such  verses  great  fore- 
tokens of  their  following  fortunes  were  placed ;  where- 
upon grew  the  word  of  Sortes  Virgiliance,  when  by  20 
sudden  opening  Virgil's  book  they  lighted  upon  some 
verse  of  his  making.  Whereof  the  Histories  of  the  Em- 
perors' Lives  are  full :  as  of  Albinus,  the  governor  of  our 
island,  who  in  his  childhood  met  with  this  verse, 

Anna  amens  capio,  nec  sat  rationis  in  armis,  ^5 

and  in  his  age  performed  it.  Although  it  were  a  very 
vain  and  godless  superstition,  as  also  it  was  to  think  that 
spirits  were  commanded  by  such  verses  —  whereupon 
this  word  charms,  derived  of  ca7^mi7ia,  cometh  —  so  yet 
serveth  it  to  show  the  great  reverence  those  wits  were  30 
held  in,  and  altogether  not  without  ground,  since  both 
the  oracles  of  Delphos  and  Sibylla's  prophecies  were 
wholly  delivered  in  verses  ;  for  that  same  exquisite  observ- 
ing of  number  and  measure  in  words,  and  that  high- 


6 


THE  POET  PROPERLY  A  MAKER. 


flying  liberty  of  conceit  proper  to  the  poet,  did  seem 
to  have  some  divine  force  in  it. 

And  may  not  I  presume  a  Httle  further  to  show  the 
reasonableness  of  this  word  vates,  and  say  that  the  holy 
5  David's  Psalms  are  a  divine  poem?  If  I  do,  1  shall  not 
do  it  without  the  testimony  of  great  learned  men,  both 
ancient  and  modern.  But  even  the  name  of  Psalms  will 
speak  for  me,  which,  being  interpreted,  is  nothing  but 
Songs ;  then,  that  it  is  fully  written  in  metre,  as  all 

lo  learned  Hebricians  agree,  although  the  rules  be  not  yet 
fully  found  ;  lastly  and  principally,  his  handling  his  proph- 
ecy, which  is  merely  poetical.  For  what  else  is  the  awak- 
ing his  musical  instruments,  the  often  and  free  changing 
of  persons,  his  notable  prosopopoeias,  when  he  maketh 

15  you,  as  it  were,  see  God  coming  in  His  majesty,  his  tell- 
ing of  the  beasts'  joyfulness  and  hills'  leaping,  but  a 
heavenly  poesy,  wherein  almost  he  showeth  himself  a 
passionate  lover  of  that  unspeakable  and  everlasting 
beauty  to  be  seen  by  the  eyes  of  the  mind,  only  cleared 

2o  by  faith  ?  But  truly  now  having  named  him,  I  fear  I 
seem  to  profane  that  holy  name,  applying  it  to  poetry, 
which  is  among  us  thrown  down  to  so  ridiculous  an  esti- 
mation. But  they  that  with  quiet  judgments  will  look 
a  little  deeper  into  it,  shall  find  the  end  and  working  of 

25  it  such  as,  being  rightly  appUed,  deserveth  not  to  be 
scourged  out  of  the  church  of  God. 

But  now  let  us  see  how  the  Greeks  named  it  and  how 
they  deemed  of  it.  The  Greeks  called  him  TroirfT-^v, 
which  name  hath,  as  the  most  excellent,  gone  through 

30  other  languages.  It  cometh  of  this  word  ttolclv,  which 
is  "to  make  "  ;  wherein  I  know  not  whether  by  luck  or 
wisdom  we  Englishmen  have  met  with  the  Greeks  in 
caUing  him  a  maker.  Which  name  how  high  and  incom- 
parable a  title  it  is,  I  had  rather  were  known  by  mark- 

35  ing  the  scope  of  other  sciences  than  by  any  partial 


THE  POET  THE  ONLY  MAKER. 


7 


allegation.  There  is  no  art  delivered  unto  mankind  that 
hath  not  the  works  of  nature  for  his  principal  object, 
without  which  they  could  not  consist,  and  on  which  they 
so  depend  as  they  become  actors  and  players,  as  it  were, 
of  what  nature  will  have  set  forth.  So  doth  the  astron-  5 
omer  look  upon  the  stars,  and,  by  that  he  seeth,  set  down 
what  order  nature  hath  taken  therein.  So  do  the  geome- 
trician and  arithmetician  in  their  divers  sorts  of  quantities. 
So  doth  the  musician  in  times  tell  you  which  by  nature 
agree,  which  not.  The  natural  philosopher  thereon  hath  10 
his  name,  and  the  moral  philosopher  standeth  upon  the 
natural  virtues,  vices,  and  passions  of  man ;  and  follow 
nature,"  saith  he,  therein,  and  thou  shalt  not  err." 
The  lawyer  saith  what  men  have  determined,  the  his- 
torian what  men  have  done.  The  grammarian  speaketh  15 
only  of  the  rules  of  speech,  and  the  rhetorician  and  logi- 
cian, considering  what  in  nature  will  soonest  prove  and 
persuade,  thereon  give  artificial  rules,  which  still  are  com- 
passed within  the  circle  of  a  question,  according  to  the 
proposed  matter.  The  physician  weigheth  the  nature  of  20 
man's  body,  and  the  nature  of  things  helpful  or  hurt- 
ful unto  it.  And  the  metaphysic,  though  it  be  in  the 
second  and  abstract  notions,  and  therefore  be  counted 
supernatural,  yet  doth  he,  indeed,  build  upon  the  depth 
of  nature.  25 

Only  the  poet,  disdaining  to  be  tied  to  any  such  sub- 
jection, lifted  up  with  the  vigor  of  his  own  invention, 
doth  grow,  in  effect,  into  another  nature,  in  making 
things  either  better  than  nature  bringeth  forth,  or,  quite 
anew,  forms  such  as  never  were  in  nature,  as  the  heroes,  30 
demi-gods,  cyclops,  chimeras,  furies,  and  such  like ;  so 
as  he  goeth  hand  in  hand  with  nature,  not  enclosed 
within  the  narrow  warrant  of  her  gifts,  but  freely  ranging 
within  the  zodiac  of  his  own  wit.  Nature  never  set 
forth  the  earth  in  so  rich  tapestry  as  divers  poets  have  35 


8 


CREATES  NATURE  AND  MAN  ANEW. 


done ;  neither  with  pleasant  rivers,  fruitful  trees,  sweet- 
smelling  flowers,  nor  whatsoever  else  may  make  the  too- 
much-loved  earth  more  lovely ;  her  world  is  brazen,  the 
poets  only  deliver  a  golden. 
5  But  let  those  things  alone,  and  go  to  man  —  for  whom 
as  the  other  things  are,  so  it  seemeth  in  him  her  utter- 
most cunning  is  employed  —  and  know  whether  she  have 
brought  forth  so  true  a  lover  as  Theagenes ;  so  constant 
a  friend  as  Pylades ;  so  valiant  a  man  as  Orlando  ;  so 
lo  right  a  prince  as  Xenophon's  Cyrus ;  so  excellent  a 
man  every  way  as  Virgil's  ^neas?  Neither  let  this  be 
jestingly  conceived,  because  the  works  of  the  one  be 
essential,  the  other  in  imitation  or  fiction ;  for  any 
understanding  knoweth  the  skill  of  each  artificer  standeth 
15  in  that  idea,  or  fore-conceit  of  the  work,  and  not  in  the 
work  itself.  And  that  the  poet  hath  that  idea  is  mani- 
fest, by  delivering  them  forth  in  such  excellency  as  he 
hath  imagined  them.  Which  delivering  forth,  also,  is 
not  wholly  imaginative,  as  we  are  wont  to  say  by  them 
20  that  build  castles  in  the  air ;  but  so  far  substantially  it 
worketh,  not  only  to  make  a  Cyrus,  which  had  been  but 
a  particular  excellency,  as  nature  might  have  done,  but 
to  bestow  a  Cyrus  upon  the  world  to  make  many  Cyruses, 
if  they  will  learn  aright  why  and  how  that  maker  made 
25  him.  Neither  let  it  be  deemed  too  saucy  a  comparison 
to  balance  the  highest  point  of  man's  wit  with  the  efficacy 
of  nature ;  but  rather  give  right  honor  to  the  Heavenly 
Maker  of  that  maker,  who,  having  made  man  to  His  own 
likeness,  set  him  beyond  and  over  all  the  works  of  that 
30  second  nature.  Which  in  nothing  he  showeth  so  much  as 
in  poetry,  when  with  the  force  of  a  divine  breath  he 
bringeth  things  forth  far  surpassing  her  doings,  with  no 
small  argument  to  the  incredulous  of  that  first  accursed 
fall  of  Adam,  —  since  our  erected  wit  maketh  us  know  what 
35  perfection  is,  and  yet  our  infected  will  keepeth  us  from 


POETRY  AN  ART  OF  IMITATION. 

reaching  unto  it.  But  these  arguments  will  by  few  be 
understood,  and  by  fewer  granted ;  thus  much  I  hope 
will  be  given  me,  that  the  Greeks  with  some  probability 
of  reason  gave  him  the  name  above  all  names  of  learn- 
ing. 

Now  let  us  go  to  a  more  ordinary  opening  of  him, 
that  the  truth  may  be  the  more  palpable ;  and  so,  I  hope, 
though  we  get  not  so  unmatched  a  praise  as  the  ety- 
mology of  his  names  will  grant,  yet  his  very  description, 
which  no  man  will  deny,  shall  not  justly  be  barred  from 
a  principal  commendation. 

Poesy,  therefore,  is  an  art  of  imitation,  for  so  Aris- 
totle termeth  it  in  his  word  /xt/xiyo-t?,  that  is  to  say,  a 
representing,  counterfeiting,  or  figuring  forth ;  to  speak 
metaphorically,  a  speaking  picture,  with  this  end,  —  to 
teach  and  delight. 

Of  this  have  been  three  general  kinds.  The  chief,  both 
in  antiquity  and  excellency,  were  they  that  did  imitate 
the  inconceivable  excellencies  of  God.  Such  were  David 
in  his  Psalms ;  Solomon  in  his  Song  of  Songs,  in  his 
Ecclesiastes  and  Proverbs  ;  Moses  and  Deborah  in  their 
Hymns  ;  and  the  writer  of  Job  ;  which,  beside  other,  the 
learned  Emanuel  Tremellius  and  Franciscus  Junius  do 
entitle  the  poetical  part  of  the  Scripture.  Against  these 
none  will  speak  that  hath  the  Holy  Ghost  in  due  holy 
reverence.  In  this  kind,  though  in  a  full  wrong  divinity, 
were  Orpheus,  Amphion,  Homer  in  his  Hymns,  and 
many  other,  both  Greeks  and  Romans.  And  this  poesy 
must  be  used  by  whosoever  will  follow  St.  James'  coun- 
sel in  singing  psalms  when  they  are  merry ;  and  I  know 
is  used  with  the  fruit  of  comfort  by  some,  when,  in  sorrow- 
ful pangs  of  their  death-bringing  sins,  they  find  the  con- 
solation of  the  never-leaving  goodness. 

The  second  kind  is  of  them  that  deal  with  matters 
philosophical :  either  moral,  as  Tyrtaeus,  Phocylides,  and 


10 


DIVISIONS  OF  POETRY, 


Cato ;  or  natural,  as  Lucretius  and  Virgil's  Georgics ;  or 
astronomical,  as  Manilius  and  Pontanus  ;  or  historical,  as 
Lucan  ;  which  who  mislike,  the  fault  is  in  their  judg- 
ment quite  out  of  taste,  and  not  in  the  sweet  food  of 

5  sweetly  uttered  knowledge. 

But  because  this  second  sort  is  wrapped  within  the 
fold  of  the  proposed  subject,  and  takes  not  the  free 
course  of  his  own  invention,  whether  they  properly 
be  poets  or  no  let  grammarians  dispute,  and  go  to  the 

lo  third,  indeed  right  poets,  of  whom  chiefly  this  question 
ariseth.  Betwixt  whom  and  these  second  is  such  a  kind 
of  difl'erence  as  betwixt  the  meaner  sort  of  painters, 
who  counterfeit  only  such  faces  as  are  set  before  them, 
and  the  more  excellent,  who  having  no  law  but  wit, 

15  bestow  that  in  colors  upon  you  which  is  fittest  for  the 
eye  to  see,  —  as  the  constant  though  lamenting  look  of 
Lucretia,  when  she  punished  in  herself  another's  fault ; 
wherein  he  painteth  not  Lucretia,  whom  he  never  saw, 
but  painteth  the  outward  beauty  of  such  a  virtue.  For 

20  these  third  be  they  which  most  properly  do  imitate  to 
teach  and  delight ;  and  to  imitate  borrow  nothing  of 
what  is,  hath  been,  or  shall  be ;  but  range,  only  reined 
with  learned  discretion,  into  the  divine  consideration  of 
what  may  be  and  should  be.    These  be  they  that,  as 

25  the  first  and  most  noble  sort,  may  justly  be  termed 
vates ;  so  these  are  waited  on  in  the  excellentest  lan- 
guages and  best  understandings  with  the  foredescribed 
name  of  poets.  For  these,  indeed,  do  merely  make  to 
imitate,  and  imitate  both  to  delight  and  teach,  and  delight 

30  to  move  men  to  take  that  goodness  in  hand,  which  with- 
out delight  they  would  fly  as  from  a  stranger ;  and  teach 
to  make  them  know  that  goodness  whereunto  they  are 
moved: — which  being  the  noblest  scope  to  which  ever 
any  learning  was  directed,  yet  want  there  not  idle  tongues 

35  to  bark  at  them. 


VERSE  NOT  ESSENTIAL. 


11 


These  be  subdivided  into  sundry  more  special  denomi- 
nations. The  most  notable  be  the  heroic,  lyric,  tragic, 
comic,  satiric,  iambic,  elegiac,  pastoral,  and  certain 
others,  some  of  these  being  termed  according  to  the 
matter  they  deal  with,  some  by  the  sort  of  verse  they  5 
liked  best  to  write  in,  —  for  indeed  the  greatest  part  of 
poets  have  apparelled  their  poetical  inventions  in  that 
numberous  kind  of  writing  which  is  called  verse.  Indeed 
but  apparelled,  verse  being  but  an  ornament  and  no 
cause  to  poetry,  since  there  have  been  many  most  excel-  10 
lent  poets  that  never  versified,  and  now  swarm  many 
versifiers  that  need  never  answer  to  the  name  of  poets. 
For  Xenophon,  who  did  imitate  so  excellently  as  to  give 
us  effigiem  justi  imperii — the  portraiture  of  a  just  empire 
under  the  name  of  Cyrus  (as  Cicero  saith  of  him)  — made  15 
therein  an  absolute  heroical  poem ;  so  did  Hehodorus  in 
his  sugared  invention  of  that  picture  of  love  in  Theagenes 
and  Chariclea  ;  and  yet  both  these  wrote  in  prose.  Which 
I  speak  to  show  that  it  is  not  riming  and  versing  that 
maketh  a  poet  —  no  more  than  a  long  gown  maketh  an  20 
advocate,  who,  though  he  pleaded  in  armor,  should  be 
an  advocate  and  no  soldier  —  but  it  is  that  feigning 
notable  images  of  virtues,  vices,  or  what  else,  with  that 
delightful  teaching,  which  must  be  the  right  describing 
note  to  know  a  poet  by.  Although  indeed  the  senate  of  25  f 
poets  hath  chosen  verse  as  their  fittest  raiment,  mean- 
ing, as  in  matter  they  passed  all  in  all,  so  in  manner  to 
go  beyond  them  ;  not  speaking,  table-talk  fashion,  or  like 
men  in  a  dream,  words  as  they  chanceably  fall  from  the 
mouth,  but  peizing  each  syllable  of  each  word  by  just  30 
proportion,  according  to  the  dignity  of  the  subject. 

Now  therefore  it  shall  not  be  amiss,  first  to  weigh 
this  latter  sort  of  poetry  by  his  works,  and  then  by  his 
parts ;  and  if  in  neither  of  these  anatomies  he  be  con- 
demnable,  I  hope  we  shall  obtain  a  more  favorable  sen-  35 


12 


PERFECTION  THE  END  OF  LEARNING. 


tence.  This  purifying  of  wit,  this  enriching  of  memory, 
enabling  of  judgment,  and  enlarging  of  conceit,  which 
commonly  we  call  learning,  under  what  name  soever  it 
come   forth  or  to  what  immediate  end  soever  it  be 

5  directed,  the  final  end  is  to  lead  and  draw  us  to  as  high 
a  perfection  as  our  degenerate  souls,  made  worse  by 
their  clay  lodgings,  can  be  capable  of.  This,  according 
to  the  inclination  of  man,  bred  many-formed  impres- 
sions.   For  some  that  thought  this  felicity  principally  to 

lo  be  gotten  by  knowledge,  and  no  knowledge  to  be  so 
high  or  heavenly  as  acquaintance  with  the  stars,  gave 
themselves  to  astronomy ;  others,  persua  ling  themselves 
to  be  de mi-gods  if  they  knew  the  causes  of  things, 
became  natural  and  supernatural  philosophers.  Some 

15  an  admirable  delight  drew  to  music,  and  some  the 
certainty  of  demonstration  to  the  mathematics ;  but  all, 
one  and  other,  having  this  scope  :  —  to  know,  and  by 
knowledge  to  Hft  up  the  mind  from  the  dungeon  of  the 
body  to  the  enjoying  his  own  divine  essence.    But  when 

20  by  the  balance  of  experience  it  was  found  that  the 
astronomer,  looking  to  the  stars,  might  fall  into  a  ditch, 
that  the  inquiring  philosopher  might  be  blind  in  himself, 
and  the  mathematician  might  draw  forth  a  straight  line 
with  a  crooked  heart ;  then  lo  !  did  proof,  the  overruler 

25  of  opinions,  make  manifest,  that  all  these  are  but  serv- 
ing sciences,  which,  as  they  have  each  a  private  end  in 
themselves,  so  yet  are  they  all  directed  to  the  highest  end 
of  the  mistress-knowledge,  by  the  Greeks  called  apxirtK- 
ToviKy,  which  stands,  as  I  think,  in  the  knowledge  of  a 

30  man's  self,  in  the  ethic  and  politic  consideration,  with 
the  end  of  well-doing,  and  not  of  well-knowing  only  :  — 
even  as  the  saddler's  next  end  is  to  make  a  good  saddle, 
but  his  further  end  to  serve  a  nobler  faculty,  which  is 
horsemanship  ;  so  the  horseman's  to  soldiery ;  and  the 

35  soldier  not  only  to  have  the  skill,  but  to  perform  the 


PHILOSOPHER  AND  HISTORIAN  AS  RIVALS  13 


practice  of  a  soldier.  So  that  the  ending  end  of  all 
earthly  learning  being  virtuous  action,  those  skills  that 
most  serve  to  bring  forth  that  have  a  most  just  title  to 
be  princes  over  all  the  rest ;  wherein,  if  we  can  show^ 
the  poet  is  worthy  to  have  it  before  any  other  competitors.  5 

Among  whom  as  principal  challengers  step  forth  the 
moral  philosophers ;  whom,  me  thinketh,  I  see  coming 
toward  me  with  a  sullen  gravity,  as  though  they  could  not 
abide  vice  by  daylight ;  rudely  clothed,  for  to  witness 
outwardly  their  contempt  of  outward  things  ;  with  books  lo 
in  their  hands  against  glory,  whereto  they  set  their 
names  ;  sophistically  speaking  against  subtility  ;  and  angry 
with  any  man  in  whom  they  see  the  foul  fault  of  anger. 
These  men,  casting  largess  as  they  go  of  definitions, 
divisions,  and  distinctions,  with  a  scornful  interrogative  15 
do  soberly  ask  whether  it  be  possible  to  find  any 
path  so  ready  to  lead  a  man  to  virtue,  as  that  which 
teacheth  what  virtue  is,  and  teacheth  it  not  only  by 
delivering  forth  his  very  being,  his  causes  and  effects, 
but  also  by  making  known  his  enemy,  vice,  which  must  20 
be  destroyed,  and  his  cumbersome  servant,  passion, 
which  must  be  mastered ;  by  showing  the  generaUties 
that  contain  it,  and  the  specialities  that  are  derived  from 
it ;  lastly,  by  plain  setting  down  how  it  extendeth  itself  out 
of  the  limits  of  a  man's  own  little  world,  to  the  govern-  25 
ment  of  families,  and  maintaining  of  public  societies  ? 

The  historian  scarcely  giveth  leisure  to  the  moraUst  to 
say  so  much,  but  that  he,  loaden  with  old  mouse-eaten 
records,  authorizing  himself  for  the  most  part  upon 
other  histories,  whose  greatest  authorities  are  built  upon  30 
the  notable  foundation  of  hearsay ;  having  much  ado  to 
accord  differing  writers,  and  to  pick  truth  out  of  partial- 
ity ;  better  acquainted  with  a  thousand  years  ago  than 
with  the  present  age,  and  yet  better  knowing  how  this 
world  goeth  than  how  his  own  wit  runneth ;  curious  for  35 


14 


THE  POET  SUPERIOR   TO  BOTH, 


antiquities  and  inquisitive  of  novelties,  a  wonder  to  young 
folks  and  a  tyrant  in  table-talk ;  denieth,  in  a  great  chafe, 
that  any  man  for  teaching  of  virtue  and  virtuous  actions 
is  comparable  to  him.  I  am  testis  temporum,  lux  veri- 
5  tatis,  vita  memoricE^  magistra  vitcE,  nicntia  vetustatis. 
The  philosopher,"  saith  he,  ^'  teacheth  a  disputative 
virtue,  but  I  do  an  active.  His  virtue  is  excellent  in  the 
dangerless  Academy  of  Plato,  but  mine  showeth  forth 
her  honorable  face  in  the  batdes  of  Marathon,  Pharsalia, 

lo  Poitiers,  and  Agincourt.  He  teacheth  virtue  by  certain 
abstract  considerations,  but  I  only  bid  you  follow  the 
footing  of  them  that  have  gone  before  you.  Old-aged 
experience  goeth  beyond  the  fine-witted  philosopher ; 
but  I  give  the  experience  of  many  ages.    Lastly,  if  he 

15  make  the  song-book,  I  put  the  learner's  hand  to  the 
lute ;  and  if  he  be  the  guide,  I  am  the  light."  Then 
would  he  allege  you  innumerable  examples,  confirming 
story  by  story,  how  much  the  wisest  senators  and 
princes  have  been  directed  by  the  credit  of  history,  as 

20  Brutus,  Alphonsus  of  Aragon  —  and  who  not,  if  need  be  ? 
At  length  the  long  line  of  their  disputation  maketh  a 
point  in  this,  —  that  the  one  giveth  the  precept,  and  the 
other  the  example. 

Now  whom  shall  we  find,  since  the  question  standeth 

25  for  the  highest  form  in  the  school  of  learning,  to  be 
moderator?  Truly,  as  me  seemeth,  the  poet;  and  if 
not  a  moderator,  even  the  man  that  ought  to  carry  the 
title  from  them  both,  and  much  more  from  all  other 
serving  sciences.    Therefore  compare  we  the  poet  with 

30  the  historian  and  with  the  moral  philosopher ;  and  if  he 
go  beyond  them  both,  no  other  human  skill  can  match 
him.  For  as  for  the  divine,  with  all  reverence  it  is  ever 
to  be  excepted,  not  only  for  having  his  scope  as  far 
beyond  any  of  these  as  eternity  exceedeth  a  moment, 

35  but  even  for  passing  each  of  these  in  themselves.  And 


DEFECTS  OF  PHILOSOPHY  AND  HISTORY.  15 


for  the  lawyer,  though  Jus  be  the  daughter  of  Justice, 
and  Justice  the  chief  of  virtues,  yet  because  he  seeketh  to 
make  men  good  rather  forniidiiie  poence  than  virtutis 
aniore ;  or,  to  say  righter,  doth  not  endeavor  to  make 
men  good,  but  that  their  evil  hurt  not  others ;  having  no  5 
care,  so  he  be  a  good  citizen,  how  bad  a  man  he  be  ; 
therefore,  as  our  wickedness  maketh  him  necessary,  and 
necessity  maketh  him  honorable,  so  is  he  not  in  the 
deepest  truth  to  stand  in  rank  with  these,  who  all 
endeavor  to  take  naughtiness  away,  and  plant  goodness  10 
even  in  the  secretest  cabinet  of  our  souls.  And  these 
four  are  all  that  any  way  deal  in  that  consideration  of 
men's  manners,  which  being  the  supreme  knowledge, 
they  that  best  breed  it  deserve  the  best  commendation. 

The  philosopher  therefore  and  the  historian  are  they  15 
which  would  win  the  goal,  the  one  by  precept,  the  other 
by  example  ;   but  both  not  having  both,  do  both  halt. 

;  For  the  philosopher,  setting  down  with  thorny  argu- 
ments the  bare  rule,  is  so  hard  of  utterance  and  so 

I  misty  to  be  conceived,  that  one  that  hath  no  other  guide  20 
but  him  shall  wade  in  him  till  he  be  old,  before  he 
shall  find  sufficient  cause  to  be  honest.  For  his  knowl- 
edge standeth  so  upon  the  abstract  and  general  that 
happy  is  that  man  who  may  understand  him,  and  more 
happy  that  can  apply  what  he  doth  understand.  On  the  25 
other  side,  the  historian,  wanting  the  precept,  is  so  tied, 
not  to  what  should  be  but  to  what  is,  to  the  particular 
truth  of  things  and  not  to  the  general  reason  of  things, 
that  his  example  draweth  no  necessary  consequence,  and 
therefore  a  less  fruitful  doctrine.  30 

Now  doth  the  peerless  poet  perform  both  ;  for  what- 
soever the  philosopher  saith  should  be  done,  he  giveth  a 
perfect  picture  of  it  in  some  one  by  whom  he  presup- 
poseth  it  was  done,  so  as  he  coupleth  the  general  notion 
with  the  particular  example.    A  perfect  picture,  I  say ;  35 


16  THE  FORCE  OF  POETICAL  TEACHING, 


for  he  yieldeth  to  the  powers  of  the  mmd  an  image  of 
that  whereof  the  philosopher  bestoweth  but  a  wordish 
description,  which  doth  neither  strike,  pierce,  nor  possess 
the  sight  of  the  soul  so  much  as  that  other  doth.  For 

5  as,  in  outward  things,  to  a  man  that  had  never  seen  an 
elephant  or  a  rhinoceros,  who  should  tell  him  most 
exquisitely  all  their  shapes,  color,  bigness,  and  particular 
marks ;  or  of  a  gorgeous  palace,  an  architector,  with 
declaring  the  full  beauties,  might  well  make  the  hearer 

lo  able  to  repeat,  as  it  were  by  rote,  all  he  had  heard,  yet 
should  never  satisfy  his  inward  conceit  with  being  wit- 
ness to  itself  of  a  true  lively  knowledge ;  but  the  same 
man,  as  soon  as  he  might  see  those  beasts  well  painted, 
or  that  house  well  in  model,  should  straightways  grow, 

15  without  need  of  any  description,  to  a  judicial  compre- 
hending of  them  :  so  no  doubt  the  philosopher,  with 
his  learned  definitions,  be  it  of  virtues  or  vices,  matters 
of  public  policy  or  private  government,  replenisheth  the 
memory  with  many  infallible  grounds  of  wisdom,  which 

20  notwithstanding  lie  dark  before  the  imaginative  and 
judging  power,  if  they  be  not  illuminated  or  figured  forth 
by  the  speaking  picture  of  poesy. 

Tully  taketh  much  pains,  and  many  times  not  without 
poetical  helps,  to  make  us  know  the  force  love  of  our 

25  country  hath  in  us.  Let  us  but  hear  old  Anchises  speak- 
ing in  the  midst  of  Troy's  flames,  or  see  Ulysses,  in  the 
fulness  of  all  Calypso's  delights,  bewail  his  absence  from 
barren  and  beggarly  Ithaca.  Anger,  the  Stoics  said,  was 
a  short  madness.   Let  but  Sophocles  bring  you  Ajax  on  a 

30  stage,  kilUng  and  whipping  sheep  and  oxen,  thinking  them 
the  army  of  Greeks,  with  their  chieftains  Agamemnon 
and  Menelaus,  and  tell  me  if  you  have  not  a  more 
familiar  insight  into  anger,  than  finding  in  the  schoolmen 
his  genus  and  difference.     See  whether  wisdom  and 

35  temperance  in  Ulysses  and  Diomedes,  valor  in  Achilles, 


PICTURES  OF  VIRTUES  AND  PASSIONS.  17 


friendship  in  Nisus  and  Euryalus,  even  to  an  ignorant 
man  carry  not  an  apparent  shining.  And,  contrarily,  the 
remorse  of  conscience  in  OEdipus ;  the  soon-repenting 
pride  of  Agamemnon  ]  the  self-devouring  cruelty  in  his 
father  Atreus ;  the  violence  of  ambition  in  the  two  5 
Theban  brothers ;  the  sour  sweetness  of  revenge  in 
Medea;  and,  to  fall  lower,  the  Terentian  Gnatho  and 
our  Chaucer's  Pandar  so  expressed  that  we  now  use 
their  names  to  signify  their  trades  ;  and  finally,  all  virtues, 
vices,  and  passions  so  in  their  own  natural  states  laid  to  10 
the  view,  that  we  seem  not  to  hear  of  them,  but  clearly 
to  see  through  them. 

But  even  in  the  most  excellent  determination  of  good- 
ness, what  philosopher's  counsel  can  so  readily  direct  a 
prince,  as  the  feigned  Cyrus  in  Xenophon  ?  Or  a  virtuous  15 
man  in  all  fortunes,  as  ^neas  in  Virgil?    Or  a  whole 
commonwealth,  as  the  way  of  Sir  Thomas  More's  Uto- 
pia?   I  say  the  way,  because  where  Sir  Thomas  More 
erred,  it  was  the  fault  of  the  man,  and  not  of  the  poet ; 
for  that  way  of  patterning  a  commonwealth  was  most  20 
absolute,  though  he,  perchance,  hath  not  so  absolutely 
performed  it.    For  the  question  is,  whether  the  feigned 
image  of  poesy,  or  the  regular  instruction  of  philosophy, 
hath  the  more  force  in  teaching.    Wherein  if  the  phi- 
losophers have  more  rightly  showed  themselves  philoso-  25 
phers  than  the  poets  have  attained  to  the  high  top  of 
their  profession,  —  as  in  truth, 

Mediocribus  esse  poetis 
Non  Dii,  non  homines,  non  concessere  columnae,  — 

it  is,  I  say  again,  not  the  fault  of  the  art,  but  that  by  few  30 
men  that  art  can  be  accomplished. 

Certainly,  even  our  Saviour  Christ  could  as  well  have 
given  the  moral  commonplaces  of  uncharitableness  and 
humbleness  as  the  divine  narration  of  Dives  and  Laz- 


18 


THE  POPULAR  PHILOSOPHER. 


anis ;  or  of  disobedience  and  mercy,  as  that  heavenly 
discourse  of  the  lost  child  and  the  gracious  father ;  but 
that  his  through- searching  wisdom  knew  the  estate  of 
Dives  burning  in  hell,  and  of  Lazarus  in  Abraham's 

5  bosom,  would  more  constantly,  as  it  were,  inhabit  both 
the  memory  and  judgment.  Truly,  for  myself,  me  seems 
I  see  before  mine  eyes  the  lost  child's  disdainful  prodi- 
gality, turned  to  envy  a  swine's  dinner;  which  by  the 
learned  divines  are  thought  not  historical  acts,  but  in- 

lo  structing  parables. 

For  conclusion,  I  say  the  philosopher  teacheth,  but  he 
teacheth  obscurely,  so  as  the  learned  only  can  under- 
stand him ;  that  is  to  say,  he  teacheth  them  that  are 
already  taught.    But  the  poet  is  the  food  for  the  ten- 

15  derest  stomachs ;  the  poet  is  indeed  the  right  popular 
philosopher.  Whereof  ^sop's  tales  give  good  proof; 
whose  pretty  allegories,  stealing  under  the  formal  tales 
of  beasts,  make  many,  more  beastly  than  beasts,  begin 
to  hear  the  sound  of  virtue  from  those  dumb  speakers.  ^ 

20  But  now  may  it  be  alleged  that  if  this  imagining  of 
matters  be'so  fit  for  the  imagination,  then  must  the  his- 
torian needs  surpass,  who  bringeth  you  images  of  true 
matters,  such  as  indeed  were  done,  and  not  such  as 
fantastically  or  falsely  may  be  suggested  to  have  been 

25  done.  Truly,  Aristotle  himself,  in  his  Discourse  of  Poesy, 
plainly  determineth  this  question,  saying  that  poetry  is 
(fiLXoaocjydjTepov  and  cnrovSatoTepovy  that  is  to  say,  it  is  more 
philosophical  and  more  studiously  serious  than  history. 
His  reason  is,  because  poesy  dealeth  with  KaOoXov,  that  is 

30  to  say  with  the  universal  consideration,  and  the  history 
with  Ka6'  cKaoTov,  the  particular.  "  Now,"  saith  he,  "  the 
universal  weighs  what  is  fit  to  be  said  or  done,  either 
in  likehhood  or  necessity  —  which  the  poesy  considereth 
in  his  imposed  names ;  and  the  particular  only  marketh 

35  whether  Alcibiades  did,  or  suffered,  this  or  that :  "  thus 


NO  PERFECT  PATTERNS  IN  HISTORY,  19 


far  Aristotle.    Which  reason  of  his,  as  all  his,  is  most 
full  of  reason. 

For,  indeed,  if  the  question  were  whether  it  were  better 
to  have  a  particular  act  truly  or  falsely  set  down,  there 
is  no  doubt  which  is  to  be  chosen,  no  more  than  whether  5 
you  had  rather  have  Vespasian's  picture  right  as  he  was, 
or,  at  the  painter's  pleasure,  nothing  resembling.  But 
if  the  question  be  for  your  own  use  and  learning,  whether 
it  be  better  to  have  it  set  down  as  it  should  be  or  as  it 
was,  then  certainly  is  more  doctrinable  the  feigned  Cyrus  10 
in  Xenophon  than  the  true  Cyrus  in  Justin;  and  the 
feigned  ^neas  in  Virgil  than  the  right  ^neas  in  Dares 
Phrygius  ;  as  to  a  lady  that  desired  to  fashion  her  counte- 
nance to  the  best  grace,  a  painter  should  more  benefit 
her  to  portrait  a  most  sweet  face,  writing  Canidia  upon  15 
it,  than  to  paint  Canidia  as  she  was,  who,  Horace  swear- 
eth,  was  foul  and  ill-favored. 

If  the  poet  do  his  part  aright,  he  will  show  you  in 
Tantalus,  Atreus,  and  such  like,  nothing  that  is  not  to 
be  shunned ;  in  Cyrus,  ^neas,  Ulysses,  each  thing  to  be  20 
followed.  Where  the  historian,  bound  to  tell  things 
as  things  were,  cannot  be  liberal  —  without  he  will  be 
poetical  —  of  a  perfect  pattern;  but,  as  in  Alexander,  or 
Scipio  himself,  show  doings,  some  to  be  liked,  some  to 
be  misliked ;  and  then  how  will  you  discern  what  to  25 
follow  but  by  your  own  discretion,  which  you  had  with- 
out reading  Quintus  Curtius?  And  whereas  a  man  may 
say,  though  in  universal  consideration  of  doctrine  the  poet 
prevaileth,  yet  that  the  history,  in  his  saying  such  a  thing 
was  done,  doth  warrant  a  man  more  in  that  he  shall  30 
follow,  —  the  answer  is  manifest:  that  if  he  stand  upon 
that  was,  as  if  he  should  argue,  because  it  rained  yester- 
day therefore  it  should  rain  to-day,  then  indeed  it  hath 
some  advantage  to  a  gross  conceit.  But  if  he  know 
an  example  only  informs  a  conjectured  likeHhood,  and  35 


20       STRATAGEMS  IN  POETRY  AND  HISTORY. 

kso  go  by  reason,  the  poet  doth  so  far  exceed  him  as  he 
is  to  frame  his  example  to  that  which  is  most  reasonable, 
^  be  it  in  warlike,  politic,  or  private  matters;  where  the 

^    historian  in  his  bare  ivas  hath  many  times  that  which  we 
^^i^5  call  fortune  to  overrule  the  best  wisdom.    Many  times 
^  H#  must  tell  events  whereof  he  can  yield  no  cause;  or 

if  he  do,  it  must  be  poetically. 
^•"■-^^  For,  that  a  feigned  example  hath  as  much  force  to 

teach  as  a  true  example  —  for  as  for  to  move,  it  is  clear, 
lo  since  the  feigned  may  be  tuned  to  the  highest  key  of 
passion — let  us  take  one  example  wherein  a  poet  and  a 
historian  do  concur.  Herodotus  and  Justin  do  both  tes- 
tify that  Zopyrus,  king  Darius'  faithful  servant,  seeing 
his  master  long  resisted  by  the  rebeUious  Babylonians, 
15  feigned  himself  in  extreme  disgrace  of  his  king ;  for 
verifying  of  which  he  caused  his  own  nose  and  ears  to 
be  cut  off,  and  so  flying  to  the  Babylonians,  was  received, 
and  for  his  known  valor  so  far  credited,  that  he  did 
find  means  to  deliver  them  over  to  Darius.  Much-like 
20  matter  doth  Livy  record  of  Tarquinius  and  his  son. 
Xenophon  excellently  feigneth  such  another  stratagem, 
performed  by  Abradatas  in  Cyrus'  behalf.  Now  would  I 
fain  know,  if  occasion  be  presented  unto  you  to  serve 
your  prince  by  such  an  honest  dissimulation,  why  do  you 
25  not  as  well  learn  it  of  Xenophon's  fiction  as  of  the 
other's  verity?  and,  truly,  so  much  the  better,  as  you 
shall  save  your  nose  by  the  bargain ;  for  Abradatas  did 
not  counterfeit  so  far. 

So,  then,  the  best  of  the  historian  is  subject  to  the 
poet ;  for  whatsoever  action  or  faction,  whatsoever  counsel, 
policy,  or  war-stratagem  the  historian  is  bound  to  recite, 
that  may  the  poet,  if  he  list,  with  his  imitation  make  his 
own,  beautifying  it  both  for  further  teaching  and  more 
delighting,  as  it  pleaseth  him  ;  having  all,  from  Dante's 
35  Heaven  to  his  Hell,  under  the  authority  of  his  pen. 


VIRTUE  EXALTED  AND  VICE  PUNISHED.  21 


Which  if  I  be  asked  what  poets  have  done?  so  as  I 
might  well  name  some,  yet  say  I,  and  say  again,  I  speak 
of  the  art,  and  not  of  the  artificer. 

Now,  to  that  which  commonly  is  attributed  to  the 
praise  of  history,  in  respect  of  the  notable  learning  5 
is  gotten  by  marking  the  success,  as  though  therein 
a  man  should  see  virtue  exalted  and  vice  punished, — 
truly  that  commendation  is  peculiar  to  poetry  and  far 
off  from  history.  For,  indeed,  poetry  ever  setteth  virtue 
so  out  in  her  best  colors,  making  Fortune  her  well-waiting  10 
handmaid,  that  one  must  needs  be  enamored  of  her. 
Well  may  you  see  Ulysses  in  a  storm,  and  in  other  hard 
plights ;  but  they  are  but  exercises  of  patience  and 
magnanimity,  to  make  them  shine  the  more  in  the  near 
following  prosperity.  And,  of  the  contrary  part,  if  evil  15 
men  come  to  the  stage,  they  ever  go  out — as  the  tragedy 
writer  answered  to  one  that  misliked  the  show  of  such 
persons  —  so  manacled  as  they  little  animate  folks  to 
follow  them.  But  the  historian,  being  captived  to  the  truth 
of  a  foolish  world,  is  many  times  a  terror  from  well-doing,  20 
and  an  encouragement  to  unbridled  wickedness.  For 
see  we  not  valiant  Miltiades  rot  in  his  fetters  ?  The  just 
Phocion  and  the  accomplished  Socrates  put  to  death 
like  traitors?  The  cruel  Severus  live  prosperously?  The 
excellent  Severus  miserably  murdered  ?  Sylla  and  Marius  25 
dying  in  their  beds?  Pompey  and  Cicero  slain  then, 
when  they  would  have  thought  exile  a  happiness?  See 
we  not  virtuous  Cato  driven  to  kill  himself,  and  rebel 
Caesar  so  advanced  that  his  name  yet,  after  sixteen  hun- 
dred years,  lasteth  in  the  highest  honor  ?  And  mark  but  30 
even  Caesar's  own  words  of  the  forenamed  Sylla  —  who 
in  that  only  did  honestly,  to  put  down  his  dishonest 
tyranny  —  litei^as  nescivit :  as  if  want  of  learning  caused 
him  to  do  well.  He  meant  it  not  by  poetry,  which,  not 
content  with  earthly  plagues,  deviseth  new  punishments  35 


22 


MOVING  HIGHER   THAN  TEACHING. 


in  hell  for  tyrants ;  nor  yet  by  philosophy,  which  teach- 
eth  occidendos  esse ;  but,  no  doubt,  by  skill  in  history, 
for  that  indeed  can  afford  you  Cypselus,  Periander, 
Phalaris,  Dionysius,  and  I  know  not  how  many  more  of 
5  the  same  kennel,  that  speed  well  enough  in  their  abomi- 
nable injustice  or  usurpation. 

I  conclude,  therefore,  that  he  excelleth  history,  not 
only  in  furnishing  the  mind  with  knowledge,  but  in  set- 
ting it  forward  to  that  which  deserveth  to  be  called  and 

lo  accounted  good ;  which  setting  forward,  and  moving  to 
well-doing,  indeed  setteth  the  laurel  crown  upon  the 
poet  as  victorious,  not  only  of  the  historian,  but  over 
the  philosopher,  howsoever  in  teaching  it  may  be  ques- 
tionable.   For  suppose  it  be  granted  —  that  which  I  sup- 

15  pose  with  great  reason  may  be  denied  —  that  the  philos- 
opher, in  respect  of  his  methodical  proceeding,  teach 
more  perfectly  than  the  poet,  yet  do  I  think  that  no 
man  is  so  much  <^tXo(^tXdo-o(/>o?  as  to  compare  the  philos- 
opher in  moving  with  the  poet.    And  that  moving  is  of  a 

20  higher  degree  than  teaching,  it  may  by  this  appear,  that 
it  is  well  nigh  both  the  cause  and  the  effect  of  teaching ; 
for  who  will  be  taught,  if  he  be  not  moved  with  desire  to 
be  taught?  And  what  so  much  good  doth  that  teaching 
bring  forth  —  I  speak  still  of  moral  doctrine  —  as  that 

25  it  moveth  one  to  do  that  which  it  doth  teach  ?  For,  as 
Aristotle  saith,  it  is  not  yvwo-tg  but  irpa^L^  must  be  the 
fruit ;  and  how  Trpa^w  cannot  be,  without  being  moved  to 
practise,  it  is  no  hard  matter  to  consider.  The  philoso- 
pher showeth  you  the  way,  he  informeth  you  of  the  par- 

30  ticularities,  as  well  of  the  tediousness  of  the  way,  as  of 
the  pleasant  lodging  you  shall  have  when  your  journey  is 
ended,  as  of  the  many  by-turnings  that  may  divert  you 
from  your  way ;  but  this  is  to  no  man  but  to  him  that 
will  read  him,  and  read  him  with  attentive,  studious  pain- 

33  fulness  ;  which  constant  desire  whosoever  hath  in  him, 


CLUSTER  OF  GRAPES  AT  FIRST. 


23 


hath  already  passed  half  the  hardness  of  the  way,  and 
therefore  is  beholding  to  the  philosopher  but  for  the  other 
half.  Nay,  truly^  learned  men  have  learnedly  thought, 
that  where  once  reason  hath  so  much  overmastered  pas- 
sion as  that  the  mind  hath  a  free  desire  to  do  well,  the  5 
inward  light  each  mind  hath  in  itself  is  as  good  as  a 
philosopher's  book ;  since  in  nature  we  know  it  is  well 
to  do  well,  and  what  is  well  and  what  is  evil,  although  not 
in  the  words  of  art  which  philosophers  bestow  upon  us ; 
for  out  of  natural  conceit  the  philosophers  drew  it.  But  10 
to  be  moved  to  do  that  which  we  know,  or  to  be  moved 
with  desire  to  know,  hoc  opus,  hie  labor  est.  ^ 

Now  therein  of  all  sciences  —  I  speak  still  of  human, 
and  according  to  the  human  conceit — is  our  poet  the 
monarch.  For  he  doth  not  only  show  the  way,  but  giv-  15 
eth  so  sweet  a  prospect  into  the  way  as  will  entice  any 
man  to  enter  into  it.  Nay,  he  doth,  .as  if  your  journey 
should  lie  through  a  fair  vineyard,  at  the  very  first  give 
you  a  cluster  of  grapes,  that  full  of  that  taste  you  may 
long  to  pass  further.  He  beginneth  not  with  obscure  20 
definitions,  which  must  blur  the  margent  with  interpreta- 
tions, and  load  the  memory  with  doubtfulness.  But  he 
Cometh  to  you  with  words  set  in  delightful  proportion, 
either  accompanied  with,  or  prepared  for,  the  well- 
enchanting  skill  of  music ;  and  with  a  tale,  forsooth,  he  25 
Cometh  unto  you,  with  a  tale  which  holdeth  children 
from  play,  and  old  men  from  the  chimney-corner,  and, 
pretending  no  more,  doth  intend  the  winning  of  the  mind 
from  wickedness  to  virtue ;  even  as  the  child  is  often 
brought  to  take  most  wholesome  things,  by  hiding  them  30 
in  such  other  as  have  a  pleasant  taste,  —  which,  if  one 
should  begin  to  tell  them  the  nature  of  the  aloes  or 
rhubarb  they  should  receive,  would  sooner  take  their 
physic  at  their  ears  than  at  their  mouth.  So  is  it  in  men, 
most  of  which  are  childish  in  the  best  things,  till  they  35 


24  THE  GOOD-FELLOW  POET  DELIGHTS. 


be  cradled  in  their  graves,  —  glad  they  will  be  to  hear 
the  tales  of  Hercules,  Achilles,  Cyrus,  ^neas;  and,  hear- 
ing them,  must  needs  hear  the  right  description  of 
wisdom,  valor,  and  justice ;  which,  if  they  had  been 
5  barely,  that  is  to  say  philosophically,  set  out,  they  would 
swear  they  be  brought  to  school  again. 

That  imitation  whereof  poetry  is,  hath  the  most  con- 
veniency  to  nature  of  all  other  ;  insomuch  that,  as  Aristotle 
saith,  those  things  which  in  themselves  are  horrible,  as 
lo  cruel  battles,  unnatural  monsters,  are  made  in  poetical 
tjU  '^^  '  '  in[iit;ation  delightful.  Truly,  I  have  known  men,  that  even 
^  ^  ■■  with  reading  Amadis  de  Gaule,  which,  God  knoweth, 

wanteth  much  of  a  perfect  poesy,  have  found  their  hearts 
moved  to  the  exercise  of  courtesy,  liberality,  and  espe^ 
15  cially  courage.  Who  readeth  ^neas  carrying  old  An- 
chises  on  his  back,  that  wisheth  not  it  were  his  fortune 
to  perform  so  excellent  an  act?  Whom  do  not  those 
words  of  Turnus  move,  the  tale  of  Turnus  having  planted 
his  image  in  the  imagination  ? 

20  Fugientem  hsec  terra  videbit? 

Usque  adeone  mori  miserum  est? 

Where  the  philosophers,  as  they  scorn  to  delight,  so  must 
they  be  content  little  to  move  —  saving  wrangling  whether 
virtue  be  the  chief  or  the  only  good,  whether  the  con- 
25  templative  or  the  active  life  do  excel  —  which  Plato 
and  Boethius  well  knew,  and  therefore  made  Mistress 
Philosophy  very  often  borrow  the  masking  raiment  of 
Poesy.  For  even  those  hard-hearted  evil  men  who 
think  virtue  a  school-name,  and  know  no  other  good 
30  but  indulgere  genioy  and  therefore  despise  the  austere 
admonitions  of  the  philosopher,  and  feel  not  the  inward 
reason  they  stand  upon,  yet  will  be  content  to  be  de- 
lighted, which  is  all  the  good-fellow  poet  seemeth  to 
promise;  and  so  steal  to  see  the  form  of  goodness  — 


APOLOGUES  OF  AGRIPPA  AND  NATHAN,  25 

which  seen,  they  cannot  but  love  —  ere  themselves  be 
aware,  as  if  they  took  a  medicine  of  cherries. 

Infinite  proofs  of  the  strange  effects  of  this  poetical 
invention  might  be  alleged  ;  only  two  shall  serve,  which 
are  so  often  remembered  as  I  think  all  men  know  them.  5 
The  one  of  Menenius  Agrippa,  who,  when  the  whole 
people  of  Rome  had  resolutely  divided  themselves  from 
the  senate,  with  apparent  show  of  utter  ruin,  though  he 
were,  for  that  time,  an  excellent  orator,  came  not  among 
them  upon  trust  either  of  figurative  speeches  or  cunning  10 
insinuations,  and  much  less  with  far-fet  maxims  of  philos- 
ophy, which,  especially  if  they  were  Platonic,  they  must 
have  learned  geometry  before  they  could  well  have  con- 
ceived ;  but,  forsooth,  he  behaves  himself  like  a  homely 
and  familiar  poet.    He  telleth  them  a  tale,  that  there  15 
was  a  time  when  all  the  parts  of  the  body  made  a 
mutinous  conspiracy  against  the  belly,  which  they  thought 
devoured  the  fruits  of  each  other's  labor;   they  con- 
cluded they  would  let  so  unprofitable  a  spender  starve. 
In  the  end,  to  be  short  —  for  the  tale  is  notorious,  and  20 
as  notorious  that  it  was  a  tale  —  with  punishing  the  belly 
they  plagued  themselves.    This,  apphed  by  him,  wrought 
such  effect  in  the  people,  as  I  never  read  that  ever  words 
brought  forth  but  then  so  sudden  and  so  good  an  altera- 
tion ;  for  upon  reasonable  conditions  a  perfect  reconcile-  25 
ment  ensued. 

The  other  is  of  Nathan  the  prophet,  who,  when  the 
holy  David  had  so  far  forsaken  God  as  to  confirm  adul- 
tery with  murder,  when  he  was  to  do  the  tenderest  office 
of  a  friend,  in  laying  his  own  shame  before  his  eyes,  —  30 
sent  by  God  to  call  again  so  chosen  a  servant,  how  doth 
he  it  but  by  telling  of  a  man  whose  beloved  lamb  was 
ungratefully  taken  from  his  bosom  ?  The  application 
most  divinely  true,  but  the  discourse  itself  feigned;  which 
made  David  (I  speak  of  the  second  and  instrumental  35 


26 


VARIOUS  SPECIES  OF  POETRY. 


cause)  as  in  a  glass  to  see  his  own  filthiness,  as  that 
heavenly  Psalm  of  Mercy  well  testifieth. 

By  these,  therefore,  examples  and  reasons,  I  think  it 
may  be  manifest  that  the  poet,  with  that  same  hand  of 

5  delight,  doth  draw  the  mind  more  effectually  than  any 
other  art  doth.  And  so  a  conclusion  not  unfitly  ensueth  : 
that  as  virtue  is  the  most  excellent  resting-place  for  all 
worldly  learning  to  make  his  end  of,  so  poetry,  being  the 
most  familiar  to  teach  it,  and  most  princely  to  move 

lo  towards  it,  in  the  most  excellent  work  is  the  most  excel- 
lent workman. 

But  I  am  content  not  only  to  decipher  him  by  his 
works  —  although  works  in  commendation  or  dispraise 
must  ever  hold  a  high  authority  —  but  more  narrowly  will 

15  examine  his  parts ;  so  that,  as  in  a  man,  though  all 
together  may  carry  a  presence  full  of  majesty  and  beauty, 
perchance  in  some  one  defections  piece  we  may  find 
a  blemish. 

Now  in  his  parts,  kinds,  or  species,  as  you  list  to  term 

20  them,  it  is  to  be  noted  that  some  poesies  have  coupled 
together  two  or  three  kinds,  —  as  tragical  and  comical, 
whereupon  is  risen  the  tragi-comical ;  some,  in  the  like 
manner,  have  mingled  prose  and  verse,  as  Sannazzaro  and 
Boethius ;  some  have  mingled  hiatters  heroical  and  pas- 

25  toral ;  but  that  cometh  all  to  one  in  this  question,  for, 
if  severed  they  be  good,  the  conjunction  cannot  be  hurt- 
ful. Therefore,  perchance  forgetting  some,  and  leaving 
some  as  needless  to  be  remembered,  it  shall  not  be 
amiss  in  a  word  to  cite  the  special  kinds,  to  see  what 

30  faults  may  be  found  in  the  right  use  of  them. 

Is  it  then  the  pastoral  poem  which  is  misliked  ?  —  for 
perchance  where  the  hedge  is  lowest  they  will  soonest 
leap  over.  Is  the  poor  pipe  disdained,  which  some- 
times out  of  MeHboeus'  mouth  can  show  the  misery  of 

35  people  under  hard   lords  and  ravening  soldiers,  and 


ELEGIAC,  IAMBIC,  SATIRIC,  COMIC. 


11. 


again,  by  Tityrus,  what  blessedness  is  derived  to  them 
that  he  lowest  from  the  goodness  of  them  that  sit  highest  ? 
sometimes,  under  the  pretty  tales  of  wolves  and  sheep, 
can  include  the  whole  considerations  of  wrong-doing  and 
patience ;  sometimes  show  that  contention  for  trifles  can  5 
get  but  a  trifling  victory ;  where  perchance  a  man  may 
see  that  even  Alexander  and  Darius,  when  they  strave 
who  should  be  cock  of  this  world's  dunghill,  the  benefit 
they  got  was  that  the  after-livers  may  say  : 

Hsec  memini  et  victum  frustra  contendere  Thyrsim ;  10 
Ex  illo  Corydon,  Corydon  est  tempore  nobis. 

Or  is  it  the  lamenting  elegiac,  which  in  a  kind  heart 
would  move  rather  pity  than  blame  ;  who  bewaileth,  with 
the  great  philosopher  Heraclitus,  the  weakness  of  man- 
kind and  the  wretchedness  of  the  world ;  who  surely  is  15 
to  be  praised,  either  for  compassionate  accompanying 
just  causes  of  lamentation,  or  for  rightly  painting  out 
how  weak  be  the  passions  of  wofulness  ? 

Is  it  the  bitter  but  wholesome  iambic,  who  rubs  the 
galled  mind,  in  making  shame  the  trumpet  of  villainy  with  20 
bold  and  open  crying  out  against  naughtiness  ? 

Or  the  satiric  ?  who 

Omne  vafer  vitium  ridenti  tangit  amico; 

who  sportingly  never  leaveth  till  he  make  a  man  laugh 
at  folly,  and  at  length  ashamed  to  laugh  at  himself,  which  25 
he  cannot  avoid  without  avoiding  the  folly ;  who,  while 
circicm  prcecordia  ludif,  giveth  us  to  feel  how  many  head- 
aches a  passionate  life  bringeth  us  to,  —  how,  when  all 
is  done, 

Est  Ulubris,  animus  si  nos  non  deficit  aequus.  30 

No,  perchance  it  is  the  comic ;  whom  naughty  play- 
makers  and  stage-keepers  have  justly  made  odious.  To 
the  argument  of  abuse  I  will  answer  after.    Only  thus 


28 


COMEDY  AND  TRAGEDY, 


much  now  is  to  be  said,  that  the  comedy  is  an  imitation 
of  the  common  errors  of  our  Hfe,  which  he  representeth 
in  the  most  ridiculous  and  scornful  sort  that  may  be,  sa 
as  it  is  impossible  that  any  beholder  can  be  content  to 
5  be  such  a  one.  Now,  as  in  geometry  the  oblique  must 
be  known  as  well  as  the  right,  and  in  arithmetic  the  odd 
as  well  as  the  even ;  so  in  the  actions  of  our  life  who 
seeth  not  the  filthiness  of  evil,  wanteth  a  great  foil  to 
perceive  the  beauty  of  virtue.    This  doth  the  comedy 

lo  handle  so,  in  our  private  and  domestical  matters,  as  with 
hearing  it  we  get,  as  it  were,  an  experience  what  is 
to  be  looked  for  of  a  niggardly  Demea,  of  a  crafty 
Davus,  of  a  flattering  Gnatho,  of  a  vain-glorious  Thraso  ; 
and  not  only  to  know  what  effects  are  to  be  expected, 

15  but  to  know  who  be  such,  by  the  signifying  badge  given 
them  by  the  comedian.  And  little  reason  hath  any  man 
to  say  that  men  learn  evil  by  seeing  it  so  set  out ; 
since,  as  I  said  before,  there  is  no  man  living,  but  by  the 
force  truth  hath  in  nature,  no  sooner  seeth  these  men 

20  play  their  parts,  but  wisheth  them  in  pistrinum,  although 
perchance  the  sack  of  his  own  faults  lie  so  behind  his 
back,  that  he  seeth  not  himself  to  dance  the  same  meas- 
ure, —  whereto  yet  nothing  can  more  open  his  eyes  than 
to  find  his  own  actions  contemptibly  set  forth. 

25  So  that  the  right  use  of  comedy  will,  I  think,  by  nobody 
be  blamed,  and  much  less  of  the  high  and  excellent 
tragedy,  that  openeth  the  greatest  wounds,  and  showeth 
forth  the  ulcers  that  are  covered  with  tissue ;  that  mak- 
eth  kings  fear  to  be  tyrants,  and  tyrants  manifest  their 

30  tyrannical  humors ;  that  with  stirring  the  effects  of  ad- 
miration and  commiseration  teacheth  the  uncertainty  of 
this  world,  and  upon  how  weak  foundations  gilden  roofs 
are  builded  ;  that  maketh  us  know  : 


35 


Qui  sceptra  ssevus  duro  imperio  regit, 
Timet  timentes,  metus  in  auctorem  redit. 


SONG  OF  PERCY  AND  DOUGLAS. 


29 


But  how  much  it  can  move,  Plutarch  yieldeth  a  notable 
testimony  of  the  abominable  tyrant  Alexander  Pheraeus ; 
from  whose  eyes  a  tragedy,  well  made  and  represented, 
drew  abundance  of  tears,  who  without  all  pity  had  mur- 
dered infinite  numbers,  and  some  of  his  own  blood  ;  so  as  5 
he  that  was  not  ashamed  to  make  matters  for  tragedies,  yet 
could  not  resist  the  sweet  violence  of  a  tragedy.  And  if 
it  wrought  no  further  good  in  him,  it  was  that  he,  in  de- 
spite of  himself,  withdrew  himself  from  hearkening  to  that 
which  might  moUify  his  hardened  heart.  But  it  is  not  10 
the  tragedy  they  do  mislike,  for  it  were  too  absurd  to 
cast  out  so  excellent  a  representation  of  whatsoever  is 
most  worthy  to  be  learned. 

Is  it  the  lyric  that  most  displeaseth,  who  with  his  tuned 
lyre  and  well-accorded  voice,  giveth  praise,  the  reward  of  15 
virtue,  to  virtuous  acts ;  who  giveth  moral  precepts  and 
natural  problems ;  who  sometimes  raiseth  up  his  voice 
to  the  height  of  the  heavens,  in  singing  the  lauds  of  the 
immortal  God?  Certainly  I  must  confess  mine  own 
barbarousness  ;  I  never  heard  the  old  song  of  Percy  and  20 
Douglas  that  I  found  not  my  heart  moved  more  than 
with  a  trumpet ;  and  yet  it  is  sung  but  by  some  blind 
crowder,  with  no  rougher  voice  than  rude  style ;  which 
being  so  evil  apparelled  in  the  dust  and  cobwebs  of  that 
uncivil  age,  what  would  it  work,  trimmed  in  the  gorgeous  25 
eloquence  of  Pindar?  In  Hungary  I  have  seen  it  the 
manner  at  all  feasts,  and  other  such  meetings,  to  have 
songs  of  their  ancestors'  valor,  which  that  right  soldier- 
like nation  think  the  chiefest  kindlers  of  brave  courage. 
The  incomparable  Lacedaemonians  did  not  only  carry  30 
that  kind  of  music  ever  with  them  to  the  field,  but  even 
at  home,  as  such  songs  were  made,  so  were  they  all 
content  to  be  singers  of  them ;  when  the  lusty  men  were 
to  tell  what  they  did,  the  old  men  what  they  had  done, 
and  the  young  men  what  they  would  do.   And  where  a  35 


30 


THE  HEROIC AL  OR  EPIC, 


man  may  say  that  Pindar  many  times  praiseth  highly 
victories  of  small  moment,  matters  rather  of  sport  than 
virtue ;  as  it  may  be  answered,  it  was  the  fault  of  the 
poet,  and  not  of  the  poetry,  so  indeed  the  chief  fault 
5  was  in  the  time  and  custom  of  the  Greeks,  who  set 
those  toys  at  so  high  a  price  that  Philip  of  Macedon 
reckoned  a  horserace  won  at  Olympus  among  his  three 
fearful  felicities.  But  as  the  unimitable  Pindar  often  did, 
so  is  that  kind  most  capable  and  most  fit  to  awake  the 

lo  thoughts  from  the  sleep  of  idleness,  to  embrace  honor- 
able enterprises. 

There  rests  the  heroical,  whose  very  name,  I  think, 
should  daunt  all  backbiters.  For  by  what  conceit  can  a 
tongue  be  directed  to  speak  evil  of  that  which  draweth 

15  with  it  no  less  champions  than  Achilles,  Cyrus,  JEneas, 

•i  Turnus,  Tydeus,  Rinaldo  ?  who  doth  not  only  teach  and 
move  to  a  truth,  but  teacheth  and  moveth  to  the  most 
high  and  excellent  truth  ;  who  maketh  magnanimity  and 
justice  shine  through  all  misty  fearfulness  and  foggy 

20  desires  ;  who,  if  the  saying  of  Plato  and  Tully  be  true, 

i  that  who  could  see  virtue  would  be  wonderfully  ravished 
with  the  love  of  her  beauty,  this  man  setteth  her  out  to 
make  her  more  lovely,  in  her  holiday  apparel,  to  the  eye 
of  any  that  will  deign  not  to  disdain  until  they  under- 

25  stand.  But  if  anything  be  already  said  in  the  defense  of 
sweet  poetry,  all  concurreth  to  the  maintaining  the  heroi- 
cal, which  is  not  only  a  kind,  but  the  best  and  most 
accomplished  kind  of  poetry.  For,  as  the  image  of  each 
action  stirreth  and  instructeth  the  mind,  so  the  lofty 

30  image  of  such  worthies  most  inflameth  the  mind  with 
desire  to  be  worthy,  and  informs  with  counsel  how  to  be 
worthy.  Only  let  ^neas  be  worn  in  the  tablet  of  your 
memory,  how  he  governeth  himself  in  the  ruin  of  his 
country ;  in  the  preserving  his  old  father,  and  carrying 

35  away  his  religious  ceremonies  ;  in  obeying  the  god's  com- 


FIRST  SUMMARY, 


31 


mandment  to  leave  Dido,  though  not  only  all  passion- 
ate kindness,  but  even  the  human  consideration  of  vir- 
tuous gratefulness,  would  have  craved  other  of  him ;  how 
in  storms,  how  in  sports,  how  in  war,  how  in  peace,  how 
a  fugitive,  how  victorious,  how  besieged,  how  besieging,  5 
how  to  strangers,  how  to  allies,  how  to  enemies,  how  to 
his  own ;  lastly,  how  in  his  inward  self,  and  how  in  his 
outward  government ;  and  I  think,  in  a  mind  most  preju- 
diced with  a  prejudicating  humor,  he  will  be  found  in 
excellency  fruitful,  —  yea,  even  as  Horace  saith,  melius  10 
Chrysippo  et  Crantore,  But  truly  I  imagine  it  falleth  out 
with  these  poet-whippers  as  with  some  good  women  who 
often  are  sick,  but  in  faith  they  cannot  tell  where.  So 
the  name  of  poetry  is  odious  to  them,  but  neither  his 
cause  nor  effects,  neither  the  sum  that  contains  him  nor  15 
the  particularities  descending  from  him,  give  any  fast 
handle  to  their  carping  dispraise. 

Since,  then,  poetry  is  of  all  human  learnings  the  most 
ancient  and  of  most  fatherly  antiquity,  as  from  whence 
other  learnings  have  taken  their  beginnings ;  since  it  is  so  20 
universal  that  no  learned  nation  doth  despise  it,  nor  barbarous 
nation  is  without  it;  since  both  Eoman  and  Greek  gave 
divine  names  unto  it,  the  one  of  prophesying,"  the  other 
of  "  making,"  and  that  indeed  that  name  of  making  "  is  fit 
for  him,  considering  that  whereas  other  arts  retain  them-  25 
solves  within  their  subject,  and  receive,  as  it  were,  their 
being  from  it,  the  poet  only  bringeth  his  own  stuff,  and  doth 
not  learn  a  conceit  out  of  a  matter,  but  maketh  matter  for 
a  conceit ;  since  neither  his  description  nor  his  end  containeth 
any  evil,  the  thing  described  cannot  be  evil ;  since  his  effects  30 
be  so  good  as  to  teach  goodness,  and  delight  the  learners  of 
it;  since  therein  —  namely  in  moral  doctrine,  the  chief  of 
all  knowledges  —  he  doth  not  only  far  pass  the  historian, 
but  for  instructing  is  well  nigh  comparable  to  the  philoso- 
pher, and  for  moving  leaveth  him  behind  him ;  since  the  35 


32       WANDERING  WORDS  OF  SMILING  RAILERS, 


Holy  Scripture,  wherein  there  is  no  nncleanness,  hatli  whole 
parts  in  it  poetical,  and  that  even  our  Saviour  Christ  vouch- 
safed to  use  the  flowers  of  it;  since  all  his  kinds  are  not 
only  in  their  united  forms,  but  in  their  several  dissections 

5  fully  commendable ;  I  think,  and  think  I  think  rightly,  the 
laurel  crown  appointed  for  triumphant  captains  doth  worthily, 
of  all  other  learnings,  honor  the  poet's  triumph. 

But  because  we  have  ears  as  well  as  tongues,  and  that 
the  lightest  reasons  that  may  be  will  seem  to  weigh 

lo  greatly,  if  nothing  be  put  in  the  counter-balance,  let  us 
hear,  and,  as  well  as  we  can,  ponder,  what  objections  be 
made  against  this  art,  which  may  be  worthy  either  of 
yielding  or  answering. 

First,  truly,  I  note  not  only  in  these  fjLLo-ofxova-oL,  poet- 

15  haters,  but  in  all  that  kind  of  people  who  seek  a  praise 
by  dispraising  others,  that  they  do  prodigally  spend  a 
great  many  wandering  words  in  quips  and  scoffs,  carping 
and  taunting  at  each  thing  which,  by  stirring  the  spleen, 
may  stay  the  brain  from  a  through-beholding  the  worthi- 

20  ness  of  the  subject.  Those  kind  of  objections,  as  they 
are  full  of  a  very  idle  easiness  —  since  there  is  nothing 
of  so  sacred  a  majesty  but  that  an  itching  tongue  may 
rub  itself  upon  it  —  so  deserve  they  no  other  answer, 
but,  instead  of  laughing  at  the  jest,  to  laugh  at  the  jester. 

25  VVe  know  a  playing  wit  can  praise  the  discretion  of  an 
ass,  the  comfortableness  of  being  in  debt,  and  the  jolly 
commodity  of  being  sick  of  the  plague.  So  of  the  con- 
trary side,  if  we  will  turn  Ovid's  verse, 

Ut  lateat  virtus  proximitate  mali, 

30  that  good  lie  hid  in  nearness  of  the  evil,"  Agrippa  will 
be  as  merry  in  showing  the  vanity  of  science,  as  Erasmus 
was  in  commending  of  folly;  neither  shall  any  man  or 
matter  escape  some  touch  of  these  smiling  railers.  But 
for  Erasmus  and  Agrippa,  they  had  another  foundation 


ADVANTAGES  OF  VERSE. 


33 


than  the  superficial  part  would  promise.  Marry,  these 
other  pleasant  fault-finders,  who  will  correct  the  verb 
before  they  understand  the  noun,  and  confute  others' 
knowledge  before  they  confirm  their  own,  I  would  have 
them  only  remember  that  scoffing  cometh  not  of  wisdom  ;  s 
so  as  the  best  title  in  true  English  they  get  with  their 
merriments  is  to  be  called  good  fools,  —  for  so  have  our 
grave  forefathers  ever  termed  that  humorous  kind  of 
jesters. 

But  that  which  giveth  greatest  scope  to  their  scorning  lo 
humor  is  riming  and  versing.     It  is  already  said,  and 
as  I  think  truly  said,  it  is  not  riming  and  versing  that 
maketh  poesy.    One  may  be  a  poet  without  versing,  and 
a  versifier  without  poetry.    But  yet  presuppose  it  were 
inseparable  —  as  indeed  it  seemeth  Scaliger  judgeth  —  15 
truly  it  were  an  inseparable  commendation.   For  if  oratio 
next  to  ratio,  speech  next  to  reason,  be  the  greatest 
gift  bestowed  upon  mortality,  that  cannot  be  praiseless 
which  doth  most  polish  that  blessing  of  speech  ;  which 
considereth  each  word,  not  only  as  a  man  may  say  by  20 
his  forcible  quality,  but  by  his  best-measured  quantity ; 
carrying  even  in  themselves  a  harmony,  —  without,  per- 
chance, number,  measure,  order,  proportion  be  in  our 
time  grown  odious. 

But  lay  aside  the  just  praise  it  hath  by  being  the  only  25 
fit  speech  for  music  —  music,  I  say,  the  most  divine 
striker  of  the  senses  —  thus  much  is  undoubtedly  true, 
that  if  reading  be  foolish  without  remembering,  memory 
being  the  only  treasurer  of  knowledge,  those  words  which 
are  fittest  for  memory  are  likewise  most  convenient  for  30 
knowledge.  Now  that  verse  far  exceedeth  prose  in  the 
knitting  up  of  the  memory,  the  reason  is  manifest ;  the 
words,  besides  their  dehght,  which  hath  a  great  affinity 
to  memory,  being  so  set,  as  one  cannot  be  lost  but 
the  whole  work  fails ;  which,  accusing  itself,  calleth  the  35 


34  ARRAIGNMENT  OF  POETRY, 

remembrance  back  to  itself,  and  so  most  strongly  con- 
firmeth  it.  Besides,  one  word  so,  as  it  were,  begetting 
another,  as,  be  it  in  rime  or  measured  verse,  by  the 
former  a  man  shall  have  a  near  guess  to  the  follower. 
5  Lastly,  even  they  that  have  taught  the  art  of  memory 
have  showed  nothing  so  apt  for  it  as  a  certain  room 
divided  into  many  places,  well  and  throughly  known; 
now  that  hath  the  verse  in  effect  perfectly,  every  word 
having  his  natural  seat,  which  seat  must  needs  make  the 
lo  word  remembered.  But  what  needeth  more  in  a  thing  so 
known  to  all  men  ?  Who  is  it  that  ever  was  a  scholar 
that  doth  not  carry  away  some  verses  of  Virgil,  Horace, 
or  Cato,  which  in  his  youth  he  learned,  and  even  to  his 
old  age  serve  him  for  hourly  lessons  ?  as  : 

15  Percontatorem  fugito,  nam  garrulus  idem  est. 

Dum  sibi  quisque  placet,  credula  turba  sumus. 

But  the  fitness  it  hath  for  memory  is  notably  proved  by 
all  delivery  of  arts,  wherein,  for  the  most  part,  from 
grammar  to  logic,  mathematic,  physic,  and  the  rest,  the 

20  rules  chiefly  necessary  to  be  borne  away  are  compiled  in 
verses.  So  that  verse  being  in  itself  sweet  and  orderly, 
and  being  best  for  memory,  the  only  handle  of  knowl- 
edge, it  must  be  in  jest  that  any  man  can  speak  against  it. 
Now  then  go  we  to  the  most  important  imputations 

25  laid  to  the  poor  poets ;  for  aught  I  can  yet  learn  they 
are  these. 

First,  that  there  being  many  other  more  fruitful  knowl- 
edges, a  man  might  better  spend  his  time  in  them  than 
in  this. 

30     Secondly,  that  it  is  the  mother  of  lies. 

Thirdly,  that  it  is  the  nurse  of  abuse,  infecting  us  with 
many  pestilent  desires,  with  a  siren's  sweetness  drawing 
the  mind  to  the  serpent's  tail  of  sinful  fancies,  —  and 
herein  especially  comedies  give  the  largest  field  to  ear, 


THE  POET  NEVER  LIETH, 


35 


as  Chaucer  saith ;  how,  both  in  other  nations  and  in  ours, 
before  poets  did  soften  us,  we  were  fall  of  courage,  given 
to  martial  exercises,  the  pillars  of  manlike  liberty,  and 
not  lulled  asleep  in  shady  idleness  with  poets'  pastimes. 

And,  lastly  and  chiefly,  they  cry  out  with  an  open  mouth,  5 
as  if  they  had  overshot  Robin  Hood,  that  Plato  banished 
them  out  of  his  Commonwealth.    Truly  this  is  much,  if 
there  be  much  truth  in  it. 

First,  to  the  first,  that  a  man  might  better  spend  his 
time  is  a  reason  indeed ;  but  it  doth,  as  they  say,  but  10 
pefere principiiim.  For  if  it  be,  as  I  affirm,  that  no  learn- 
ing is  so  good  as  that  which  teacheth  and  moveth  to 
virtue,  and  that  none  can  both  teach  and  move  thereto 
so  much  as  poesy,  then  is  the  conclusion  manifest  that 
ink  and  paper  cannot  be  to  a  more  profitable  purpose  15 
employed.  And  certainly,  though  a  man  should  grant 
their  first  assumption,  it  should  follow,  me  thinks,  very 
unwillingly,  that  good  is  not  good  because  better  is 
better.  But  I  still  and  utterly  deny  that  there  is  sprung 
out  of  earth  a  more  fruitful  knowledge.  20 

To  the  second,  therefore,  that  they  should  be  the 
principal  liars,  I  answer  paradoxically,  but  truly,  I  think 
truly,  that  of  all  writers  under  the  sun  the  poet  is  the 
least  liar ;  and  though  he  would,  as  a  poet  can  scarcely 
be  a  liar.  The  astronomer,  with  his  cousin  the  geometri-  25 
cian,  can  hardly  escape  when  they  take  upon  them  to 
measure  the  height  of  the  stars.  How  often,  think  you, 
do  the  physicians  lie,  when  they  aver  things  good  for 
sicknesses,  which  afterwards  send  Charon  a  great  number 
of  souls  drowned  in  a  potion  before  they  come  to  his  30 
ferry  ?  And  no  less  of  the  rest  which  take  upon  them  to 
affirm.  Now  for  the  poet,  he  nothing  afiflrmeth,  and 
therefore  never  lieth.  For,  as  I  take  it,  to  lie  is  to  affirm 
that  to  be  true  which  is  false  ;  so  as  the  other  artists,  and 
especially  the  historian,  affirming  many  things,  can,  in  35 


36 


THE  POET  NEVER  AFFIRMETH. 


the  cloudy  knowledge  of  mankind,  hardly  escape  from 
many  lies.  But  the  poet,  as  I  said  before,  never  affirmeth. 
The  poet  never  maketh  any  circles  about  your  imagina- 
tion, to  conjure  you  to  believe  for  true  what  he  writeth. 
5  He  citeth  not  authorities  of  other  histories,  but  even  for 
his  entry  calleth  the  sweet  Muses  to  inspire  into  him  a 
good  invention ;  in  troth,  not  laboring  to  tell  you  what 
is  or  is  not,  but  what  should  or  should  not  be.  And 
therefore  though  he  recount  things  not  true,  yet  because 

lo  he  telleth  them  not  for  true  he  Ueth  not ;  without  we 
will  say  that  Nathan  lied  in  his  speech,  before  alleged, 
to  David ;  which,  as  a  wicked  man  durst  scarce  say,  so 
think  I  none  so  simple  would  say  that  ^sop  lied  in  the 
tales  of  his  beasts ;  for  who  thinketh  that  ^-^^sop  wrote  it 

15  for  actually  true,  were  well  worthy  to  have  his  name 
chronicled  among  the  beasts  he  writeth  of.  What  child 
is  there  that,  coming  to  a  play,  and  seeing  Thebes  writ- 
ten in  great  letters  upon  an  old  door,  doth  believe  that 
it  is  Thebes  ?    If  then  a  man  can  arrive  at  that  child's- 

20  age,  to  know  that  the  poet's  persons  and  doings  are  but 
pictures  what  should  be,  and  not  stories  what  have  been, 
they  will  never  give  the  lie  to  things  not  affirmatively  but 
allegorically  and  figuratively  written.  And  therefore,  as  in 
history  looking  for  truth,  they  may  go  away  full-fraught 

25  with  falsehood,  so  in  poesy  looking  but  for  fiction,  they 
shall  use  the  narration  but  as  an  imaginative  ground- plot 
of  a  profitable  invention.  But  hereto  is  replied  that 
the  poets  give  names  to  men  they  write  of,  which  argueth 
a  conceit  of  an  actual  truth,  and  so,  not  being  true, 

30  proveth  a  falsehood.  And  doth  the  lawyer  lie  then, 
when,  under  the  names  of  John  of  the  Stile,  and  John 
of  the  Nokes,  he  putteth  his  case?  But  that  is  easily 
answered  :  their  naming  of  men  is  but  to  make  their 
picture  the  more  lively,  and  not  to  build  any  history. 

35  Painting  men,  they  cannot  leave  men  nameless.    We  see 


MAN'S   WIT  ABUSETH  POETRY. 


37 


we  cannot  play  at  chess  but  that  we  must  give  names  to 
our  chess-men ;  and  yet,  me  thinks,  he  were  a  very  par- 
tial champion  of  truth  that  would  say  we  lied  for  giving 
a  piece  of  wood  the  reverend  title  of  a  bishop.  The 
poet  nameth  Cyrus  and  ^neas  no  other  way  than  to  5 
show  what  men  of  their  fames,  fortunes,  and  estates 
should  do. 

Their  third  is,  how  much  it  abuseth  men's  wit,  training 
it  to  wanton  sinfulness  and  lustful  love.  For  indeed  that 
is  the  principal,  if  not  the  only,  abuse  I  can  hear  alleged.  10 
They  say  the  comedies  rather  teach  than  reprehend 
amorous  conceits.  They  say  the  lyric  is  larded  with  pas- 
sionate sonnets,  the  elegiac  weeps  the  want  of  his 
mistress,  and  that  even  to  the  heroical  Cupid  hath 
ambitiously  climbed.  Alas  !  Love,  I  would  thou  couldst  15 
as  well  defend  thyself  as  thou  canst  offend  others  !  I 
would  those  on  whom  thou  dost  attend  could  either  put 
thee  away,  or  yield  good  reason  why  they  keep  thee  ! 
But  grant  love  of  beauty  to  be  a  beastly  fault,  although 
it  be  very  hard,  since  only  man,  and  no  beast,  hath  that  20 
gift  to  discern  beauty ;  grant  that  lovely  name  of  Love 
to  deserve  all  hateful  reproaches,  although  even  some  of 
my  masters  the  philosophers  spent  a  good  deal  of  their 
lamp-oil  in  setting  forth  the  excellency  of  it ;  grant,  I 
say,  whatsoever  they  will  have  granted,  —  that  not  only  25 
love,  but  lust,  but  vanity,  but,  if  they  list,  scurrility,  pos- 
sesseth  many  leaves  of  the  poets'  books  ;  yet  think  I  when 
this  is  granted,  they  will  find  their  sentence  may  with 
good  manners  put  the  last  words  foremost,  and  not  say 
that  poetry  abuseth  man's  wit,  but  that  man's  wit  abuseth  30 
poetry.  For  I  will  not  deny,  but  that  man's  wit  may 
make  poesy,  which  should  be  elKao-TLKrjy  which  some 
learned  have  defined,  figuring  forth  good  things,  to  be 
^pavTao-TLKy,  which  doth  contrariwise  infect  the  fancy  with 
unworthy  objects ;  as  the  painter  that  should  give  to  35 


38 


ALL  GOOD  THINGS  ABUSED. 


the  eye  either  some  excellent  perspective,  or  some  fine 
picture  fit  for  building  or  fortification,  or  containing  in  it 
some  notable  example,  as  Abraham  sacrificing  his  son 
Isaac,  Judith  killing  Holofernes,  David  fighting  with 

5  Goliath,  may  leave  those,  and  please  an  ill-pleased  eye 
with  wanton  shows  of  better-hidden  matters.  But  what ! 
shall  the  abuse  of  a  thing  make  the  right  use  odious? 
Nay,  truly,  though  I  yield  that  poesy  may  not  only  be 
abused,  but  that  being  abused,  by  the  reason  of  his  sweet 

lo  charming  force,  it  can  do  more  hurt  than  any  other  army 
of  words,  yet  shall  it  be  so  far  from  concluding  that  the 
abuse  should  give  reproach  to  the  abused,  that  contrari- 
wise it  is  a  good  reason,  that  whatsoever,  being  abused, 
doth  most  harm,  being  rightly  used  —  and  upon  the  right 

15  use  each  thing  receiveth  his  title  —  doth  most  good.  Do 
we  not  see  the  skill  of  physic,  the  best  rampire  to  our 
often-assaulted  bodies,  being  abused,  teach  poison,  the 
most  violent  destroyer?  Doth  not  knowledge  of  law, 
whose  end  is  to  even  and  right  all  things,  being  abused, 

20  grow  the  crooked  fosterer  of  horrible  injuries  ?  Doth  not, 
to  go  in  the  highest,  God's  word  abused  breed  heresy,  and 
his  name  abused  become  blasphemy?  Truly  a  needle 
cannot  do  much  hurt,  and  as  truly  —  with  leave  of  ladies 
be  it  spoken  —  it  cannot  do  much  good.    With  a  sword 

25  thou  mayst  kill  thy  father,  and  with  a  sword  thou  mayst 
defend  thy  prince  and  country.  So  that,  as  in  their  call- 
ing poets  the  fathers  of  lies  they  say  nothing,  so  in  this 
their  argument  of  abuse  they  prove  the  commendation. 
They  allege  herewith,  that  before  poets  began  to  be 

30  in  price  our  nation  hath  set  their  hearts'  delight  upon 
action,  and  not  upon  imagination;  rather  doing  things 
worthy  to  be  written,  than  writing  things  fit  to  be  done. 
What  that  before- time  was,  I  think  scarcely  Sphinx  can 
tell ;  since  no  memory  is  so  ancient  that  hath  the  prece- 

35  dence  of  poetry.    And  certain  it  is  that,  in  our  plainest 


THE  COMPANION  OF  CAMPS. 


39 


homeliness,  yet  never  was  the  Albion  nation  without 
poetry.  Marry,  this  argument,  though  it  be  levelled 
against  poetry,  yet  is  it  indeed  a  chain-shot  against  all 
learning,  —  or  bookishness,  as  they  commonly  term  it.  Of 
such  mind  were  certain  Goths,  of  whom  it  is  written  s 
that,  having  in  the  spoil  of  a  famous  city  taken  a  fair 
library,  one  hangman  —  belike  fit  to  execute  the  fruits  of 
their  wits  —  who  had  murdered  a  great  number  of  bodies, 
would  have  set  fire  in  it.  "No,"  said  another  very 
gravely,  "  take  heed  what  you  do ;  for  while  they  are  lo 
busy  about  these  toys,  we  shall  with  more  leisure  con- 
quer their  countries."  This,  indeed,  is  the  ordinary 
doctrine  of  ignorance,  and  many  words  sometimes  I 
have  heard  spent  in  it ;  but  because  this  reason  is  gen- 
erally against  all  learning,  as  well  as  poetry,  or  rather  all  15 
learning  but  poetry ;  because  it  were  too  large  a  digres- 
sion to  handle,  or  at  least  too  superfluous,  since  it  is 
manifest  that  all  government  of  action  is  to  be  gotten 
by  knowledge,  and  knowledge  best  by  gathering  many 
knowledges,  which  is  reading ;  I  only,  with  Horace,  to  20 
him  that  is  of  that  opinion 

Jubeo  stultum  esse  libenter; 

for  as  for  poetry  itself,  it  is  the  freest  from  this  objec- 
tion, for  poetry  is  the  companion  of  the  camps.  I  dare 
undertake,  Orlando  Furioso  or  honest  King  Arthur  will  25 
never  displease  a  soldier ;  but  the  quiddity  of  e7ts,  and 
prima  materia^  will  hardly  agree  with  a  corselet.  And 
therefore,  as  I  said  in  the  beginning,  even  Turks  and 
Tartars  are  delighted  with  poets.  Homer,  a  Greek, 
flourished  before  Greece  flourished ;  and  if  to  a  slight  30 
conjecture  a  conjecture  may  be  opposed,  truly  it  may 
seem,  that  as  by  him  their  learned  men  took  almost  their 
first  light  of  knowledge,  so  their  active  men  received 
their  first  motions  of  courage.    Only  Alexander's  example 


40  ALEXANDER  AND  HOMER. 

may  serve,  who  by  Plutarch  is  accounted  of  such  virtue, 
that  Fortune  was  not  his  guide  but  his  footstool ;  whose 
acts  speak  for  him,  though  Plutarch  did  not ;  indeed  the 
phoenix  of  warlike  princes.  This  Alexander  left  his 
5  schoolmaster,  living  Aristotle,  behind  him,  but  took  dead 
Homer  with  him.  He  put  the  philosopher  Callisthenes 
to  death,  for  his  seeming  philosophical,  indeed  mutinous, 
stubbornness ;  but  the  chief  thing  he  was  ever  heard  to 
wish  for  was   that   Homer  had  been  alive.    He  well 

lo  found  he  received  more  bravery  of  mind  by  the  pattern 
of  Achilles,  than  by  hearing  the  definition  of  fortitude. 
And  therefore  if  Cato  misliked  Fulvius  for  carrying 
Ennius  with  him  to  the  field,  it  may  be  answered  that  if 
Cato  misliked  it,  the  noble  Fulvius  liked  it,  or  else  he 

15  had  not  done  it.  For  it  was  not  the  excellent  Cato  Uti- 
censis,  whose  authority  I  would  much  more  have  rev- 
erenced ;  but  it  was  the  former,  in  truth  a  bitter  punisher 
of  faults,  but  else  a  man  that  had  never  sacrificed  to  the 
Graces.     He  misliked  and  cried  out  upon  all  Greek 

20  learning ;  and  yet,  being  fourscore  years  old,  began  to 
learn  it,  belike  fearing  that  Pluto  understood  not  Latin. 
Indeed,  the  Roman  laws  allowed  no  person  to  be  carried 
to  the  wars  but  he  that  was  in  the  soldiers'  roll.  And 
therefore  though  Cato  misliked  his  unmustered  person, 

25  he  misliked  not  his  work.  And  if  he  had,  Scipio  Nasica, 
judged  by  common  consent  the  best  Roman,  loved 
him.  Both  the  other  Scipio  brothers,  who  had  by  their 
virtues  no  less  surnames  than  of  Asia  and  Afric,  so  loved, 
him  that  they  caused  his  body  to  be  buried  in  their 

30  sepulchre.  So  as  Cato's  authority  being  but  against  his 
person,  and  that  answered  with  so  far  greater  than  him- 
self, is  herein  of  no  validity. 

But  now,  indeed,  my  burthen  is  great,"  that  Plato's 
name  is  laid  upon  me,  whom,  I  must  confess,  of  all  philoso- 

35  phers  I  have  ever  esteemed  most  worthy  of  reverence ; 


PHILOSOPHERS  UNGRATEFUL  PRENTICES. 

and  with  great  reason,  since  of  all  philosophers  he  is  the 
most  poetical ;  yet  if  he  will  defile  the  fountain  out  of 
which  his  flowing  streams  have  proceeded,  let  us  boldly 
examine  with  what  reasons  he  did  it. 

First,  truly,  a  man  might  maliciously  object  that  Plato, 
being  a  philosopher,  was  a  natural  enemy  of  poets.  For, 
indeed,  after  the  philosophers  had  picked  out  of  the 
sweet  mysteries  of  poetry  the  right  discerning  true  points 
of  knowledge,  they  forthwith,  putting  it  in  method,  and 
making  a  school-art  of  that  which  the  poets  did  only 
teach  by  a  divine  delightfulness,  beginning  to  spurn  at 
their  guides,  like  ungrateful  prentices  were  not  content 
to  set  up  shops  for  themselves,  but  sought  by  all  means 
to  discredit  their  masters ;  which  by  the  force  of  delight 
being  barred  them,  the  less  they  could  overthrow  them 
the  more  they  hated  them.  For,  indeed,  they  found  for 
Homer  seven  cities  strave  who  should  have  him  for  their 
citizen ;  where  many  cities  banished  philosophers,  as  not 
fit  members  to  live  among  them.  For  only  repeating 
certain  of  P_^uripides'  verses,  many  Athenians  had  their 
lives  saved  of  the  Syracusans,  where  the  Athenians 
themselves  thought  many  philosophers  unworthy  to  live. 
Certain  poets  as  Simonides  and  Pindar,  had  so  prevailed 
with  Hiero  the  First,  that  of  a  tyrant  they  made  him  a 
just  king ;  where  Plato  could  do  so  little  with  Dionysius, 
that  he  himself  of  a  philosopher  was  made  a  slave.  But 
who  should  do  thus,  I  confess,  should  requite  the  objec- 
tions made  against  poets  with  like  cavillations  against 
philosophers  ;  as  likewise  one  should  do  that  should  bid 
one  read  Ph^edrus  or  Symposium  in  Plato,  or  the  Dis- 
course of  Love  in  Plutarch,  and  see  whether  any  poet 
do  authorize  abominable  filthiness,  as  they  do. 

Again,  a  man  might  ask  out  of  what  commonwealth 
Plato  doth  banish  them.  In  sooth,  thence  where  he  him- 
self alloweth  community  of  women.    So  as  belike  this 


42 


SUPERSTITION  VERSUS  ATHEISM. 


banishment  grew  not  for  effeminate  wantonness,  since 
little  should  poetical  sonnets  be  hurtful  when  a  man 
might  have  what  woman  he  listed.  But  I  honor  philo- 
sophical instructions,  and  bless  the  wits  which  bred  them, 
5  so  as  they  be  not  abused,  which  is  likewise  stretched  to 
poetry.  Saint  Paul  himself,  who  yet,  for  the  credit  of 
poets,  allegeth  twice  two  poets,  and  one  of  them  by  the 
name  of  a  prophet,  setteth  a  watchword  upon  philoso- 
phy,—  indeed  upon  the  abuse.    So  doth  Plato  upon 

lo  the  abuse,  not  upon  poetry.  Plato  found  fault  that  the 
poets  of  his  time  filled  the  world  with  wrong  opinions  of 
the  gods,  making  light  tales  of  that  unspotted  essence, 
and  therefore  would  not  have  the  youth  depraved  with 
such  opinions.    Herein  may  much  be  said ;  let  this  suf- 

15  fice  :  the  poets  did  not  induce  such  opinions,  but  did 
imitate  those  opinions  already  induced.  For  all  the 
Greek  stories  can  well  testify  that  the  very  religion  of 
that  time  stood  upon  many  and  many-fashioned  gods  ; 
not  taught  so  by  the  poets,  but  followed  according  to  their 

20  nature  of  imitation.  Who  list  may  read  in  Plutarch 
the  discourses  of  Isis  and  Osiris,  of  the  Cause  why 
Oracles  ceased,  of  the  Divine  Providence,  and  see 
whether  the  theology  of  that  nation  stood  not  upon  such 
dreams,  —  which  the  poets  indeed  superstitiously  ob- 

25  served ;  and  truly,  since  they  had  not  the  light  of  Christ, 
did  much  better  in  it  than  the  philosophers,  who,  shaking 
off  superstition,  brought  in  atheism. 

Plato  therefore,  whose  authority  I  had  much  rather 
justly  construe  than  unjustly  resist,  meant  not  in  general 

30  of  poets,  in  those  words  of  which  Julius  Scaliger  saith, 
Qua  aiithoritate  barbari  qiiidam  atque  hispidi  abuti 
velint  ad  poetas  e  republica  exigendos ;  but  only  meant 
to  drive  out  those  wrong  opinions  of  the  Deity,  whereof 
now,  without  further  law,  Christianity  hath  taken  away 

35  all  the  hurtful  belief,  perchance,  as  he  thought,  nourished 


POETS  HONORED  BY  THE  WISEST. 


43 


by  the  then  esteemed  poets.  And  a  man  need  go  no  farther 
than  to  Plato  himself  to  know  his  meaning ;  who,  in  his 
dialogue  called  Ion,  giveth  high  and  rightly  divine  com- 
mendation unto  poetry.  So  as  Plato,  banishing  the  abuse, 
not  the  thing,  not  banishing  it,  but  giving  due  honor  unto  5 
it,  shall  be  our  patron  and  not  our  adversary.  For, 
indeed,  I  had  much  rather,  since  truly  I  may  do  it,  show 
their  mistaking  of  Plato,  under  whose  lion's  skin  they 
would  make  an  ass-like  braying  against  poesy,  than  go 
about  to  overthrow  his  authority ;  whom,  the  wiser  a  10 
man  is,  the  more  just  cause  he  shall  find  to  have  in 
admiration ;  especially  since  he  attributeth  unto  poesy 
more  than  myself  do,  namely  to  be  a  very  inspiring  of  a 
divine  force,  far  above  man's  wit,  as  in  the  forenamed 
dialogue  is  apparent.  15 

Of  the  other  side,  who  would  show  the  honors  have 
been  by  the  best  sort  of  judgments  granted  them,  a 
whole  sea  of  examples  would  present  themselves  :  Alex- 
anders, Caesars,  Scipios,  all  favorers  of  poets ;  Laelius, 
called  the  Roman  Socrates,  himself  a  poet,  so  as  part  of  20 
Heautontimoroumenos  in  Terence  was  supposed  to  be 
made  by  him.  And  even  the  Greek  Socrates,  whom 
Apollo  confirmed  to  be  the  only  wise  man,  is  said  to 
have  spent  part  of  his  old  time  in  putting  ^sop's  Fables 
into  verses  ;  and  therefore  full  evil  should  it  become  his  25 
scholar,  Plato,  to  put  such  words  in  his  master's  mouth 
against  poets.  But  what  needs  more?  Aristotle  writes 
the  Art  of  Poesy ;  and  why,  if  it  should  not  be  written  ? 
Plutarch  teacheth  the  use  to  be  gathered  of  them  ;  and 
how,  if  they  should  not  be  read?  And  who  reads  Plu-  30 
tarch's  either  history  or  philosophy,  shall  find  he  trim- 
meth  both  their  garments  with  guards  of  poesy.  But  I 
list  not  to  defend  poesy  with  the  help  of  his  underling 
historiography.  Let  it  suffice  that  it  is  a  fit  soil  for 
praise  to  dwell  upon ;  and  what  dispraise  may  set  upon  35 


SECOND  SUMMARY, 


it,  is  either  easily  overcome,  or  transformed  into  just 
commendation. 

So  that  since  the  excellencies  of  it  may  be  so  easily  and 
so  justly  confirmed,  and  the  low-creeping  objections  so  soon 
trodden  down :  it  not  being  an  art  of  lies,  but  of  true  doc- 
trine ;  not  of  effeminateness,  but  of  notable  stirring  of  cour- 
age ;  not  of  abusing  man's  wit,  but  of  strengthening  man's 
wit ;  not  banished,  but  honored  by  Plato ;  let  us  rather  plant 
more  laurels  for  to  engarland  our  poets'  heads  —  which  honor 
of  being  laureate,  as  besides  them  only  triumphant  captains 
were,  is  a  sufficient  authority  to  show  the  price  they  ought  to 
be  held  in  —  than  suffer  the  ill-savored  breath  of  such  wrong 
speakers  once  to  blow  upon  the  clear  springs  of  poesy. 

But  since  I  have  run  so  long  a  career  in  this  matter, 
me  tliinks,  before  I  give  my  pen  a  full  stop,  it  shall  be 
but  a  little  more  lost  time  to  inquire  why  England,  the 
mother  of  excellent  minds,  should  be  grown  so  hard  a 
stepmother  to  poets ;  who  certainly  in  wit  ought  to  pass 
all  others,  since  all  only  proceedeth  from  their  wit,  being 
indeed  makers  of  themselves,  not  takers  of  others.  How 
can  I  but  exclaim, 

Musa,  mihi  causas  memora,  quo  numine  laeso? 

Sweet  poesy  !  that  hath  anciently  had  kings,  emperors, 
senators,  great  captains,  such  as,  besides  a  thousand 
others,  David,  Adrian,  Sophocles,  Germanicus,  not  only 
to  favor  poets,  but  to  be  poets ;  and  of  our  nearer  times 
can  present  for  her  patrons  a  Robert,  King  of  Sicily ; 
the  great  King  Francis  of  France ;  King  James  of  Scot- 
land ;  such  cardinals  as  Bembus  and  Bibbiena ;  such 
famous  preachers  and  teachers  as  Beza  and  Melancthon ; 
so  learned  philosophers  as  Fracastorius  and  Scaliger ;  so 
great  orators  as  Pontanus  and  Muretus ;  so  piercing  wits 
as  George  Buchanan;  so  grave  counsellors  as,  besides 
many,  but  before  all,  that  Hospital  of  France,  —  than 


NO  POETS  IN  IDLE  ENGLAND. 


45 


whom,  I  think,  that  realm  never  brought  forth  a  more 
accompHshed  judgment  more  firmly  builded  upon  virtue 
I  say  these,  with  numbers  of  others,  not  only  to  read 
others'  poesies  but  to  poetize  for  others'  reading.  That 
poesy,  thus  embraced  in  all  other  places,  should  only  5 
find  in  our  time  a  hard  welcome  in  England,  I  think  the 
very  earth  lamenteth  it,  and  therefore  decketh  our  soil 
with  fewer  laurels  than  it  was  accustomed.    For  hereto- 
fore poets  have  in  England  also  flourished  ;  and,  which 
is  to  be  noted,  even  in  those  times  when  the  trumpet  of  10 
Mars  did  sound  loudest.    And  now  that  an  over-faint 
quietness  should  seem  to  strew  the  house  for  poets,  they 
are  almost  in  as  good  reputation  as  the  mountebanks  at 
Venice.    Truly  even   that,  as  of  the  one  side  it  giveth 
great  praise  to  poesy,  which,  like  Venus  —  but  to  better  15 
purpose  —  hath  rather  be  troubled  in  the  net  with  Mars, 
than  enjoy  the  homely  quiet  of  Vulcan ;  so  serves  it 
for  a  piece  of  a  reason  why  they  are  less  grateful  to  idle 
England,  which  now  can  scarce  endure  the  pain  of  a 
pen.     Upon  this  necessarily  followeth,  that  base  men  20 
with  servile  wits  undertake  it,  who  think  it  enough  if 
they  can  be  rewarded  of  the  printer.    And  so  as  Epami- 
nondas  is  said,  with  the  honor  of  his  virtue  to  have 
made  an  office,  by  his  exercising  it,  which  before  was 
contemptible,  to  become   highly  respected ;   so  these  25 
men,  no  more  but  setting  their  names  to  it,  by  their  own 
disgracefulness  disgrace  the  most  graceful  poesy.  For 
now,  as  if  all  the  Muses  were  got  with  child  to  bring 
forth  bastard  poets,  without  any  commission  they  do 
post  over  the  banks  of  Helicon,  till  they  make  their  30 
readers  more  weary  than  post-horses ;  while,  in  the  mean 
time,  they,  ' 

Queis  meliore  luto  finxit  prsecordia  Titan, 

are  better  content  to  suppress  the  outflowings  of  their 


46 


POETRY  NO  HUMAN  SKILL, 


wit,  than  by  publishing  them  to  be  accounted  knights  of 
the  same  order. 

But  I  that,  before  ever  I  durst  aspire  unto  the  dignity, 
am  admitted  into  the  company  of  the  paper-blurrers,  do 
5  find  the  very  true  cause  of  our  wanting  estimation  is 
want  of  desert,  taking  upon  us  to  be  poets  in  despite  of 
Pallas.    Now  wherein  we  want  desert  were  a  thank- 
worthy labor  to  express ;  but  if  I  knew,  I  should  have 
mended  myself.    But  as  I  never  desired  the  title,  so  have 
lo  I  neglected  the  means  to  come  by  it ;  only,  overmastered 
by  some  thoughts,  I  yielded  an  inky  tribute  unto  them. 
Marry,  they  that  delight  in  poesy  itself  should  seek  to 
know  what  they  do  and  how  they  do  ;  and  especially  look 
themselves  in  an  unflattering  glass  of  reason,  if  they  be 
15  inclinable  unto  it.    For  poesy  must  not  be  drawn  by 
the  ears,  it  must  be  gently  led,  or  rather  it  must  lead  ; 
which  was  partly  the  cause  that  made  the  ancient  learned 
affirm  it  was  a  divine  gift,  and  no  human  skill,  since  all 
other  knowledges  He  ready  for  any  that  hath  strength  of 
20  wit,  a  poet  no  industry  can  make  if  his  own  genius  be 
not  carried  into  it.    And  therefore  is  it  an  old  proverb  : 
Orator  fit,  poeta  nascitur.    Yet  confess  I  always  that, 
as  the  fertilest  ground  must  be  manured,  so  must  the 
highest- flying  wit  have  a  Daedalus  to  guide  him.  That 
25  Daedalus,  they  say,  both  in  this  and  in  other,  hath  three 
wings  to  bear  itself  up  into  the  air  of  due  commenda- 
tion :  that  is,  art,  imitation,  and  exercise.    But  these 
neither  artificial  rules  nor  imitative  patterns,  we  much 
cumber  ourselves  withal.    Exercise  indeed  we  do,  but 
30  that  very  fore-backwardly,  for  where  we  should  exercise 
to  know,  we  exercise  as  having  known ;  and  so  is  our 
brain  delivered  of  much  matter  which  never  was  begot- 
ten by  knowledge.    For  there  being  two  principal  parts, 
matter  to  be  expressed  by  words,  and  words  to  express 
35  the  matter,  in  neither  we  use  art  or  imitation  rightly. 


CHAUCER,  SACKVILLE,  SURREY,  SPENSER. 


47 


Our  matter  is  quodlibet  indeed,  though  wrongly  perform- 
ing Ovid's  verse, 


never  marshalling  it  into  any  assured  rank,  that  almost 
the  readers  cannot  tell  where  to  find  themselves.  5 

Chaucer,  undoubtedly,  did  excellently  in  his  Troilus 
and  Cressida ;  of  whom,  truly,  I  know  not  whether  to 
marvel  more,  either  that  he  in  that  misty  time  could  see 
so  clearly,  or  that  we  in  this  clear  age  walk  so  stumblingly 
after  him.  Yet  had  he  great  wants,  fit  to  be  forgiven  in  10 
so  reverend  antiquity.  I  account  the  Mirror  of  Magis- 
trates meetly  furnished  of  beautiful  parts ;  and  in  the 
Earl  of  Surrey's  lyrics  many  things  tasting  of  a  noble 
birth,  and  worthy  of  a  noble  mind.  The  Shepherd's 
Calendar  hath  much  poetry  in  his  eclogues,  indeed  worthy  15 
the  reading,  if  I  be  not  deceived.  That  same  framing 
of  his  style  to  an  old  rustic  language  I  dare  not  allow, 
since  neither  Theocritus  in  Greek,  Virgil  in  Latin,  nor 
Sannazzaro  in  Italian  did  affect  it.  Besides  these,  I  do 
not  remember  to  have  seen  but  few  (to  speak  boldly)  2a 


whereof,  let  but  most  of  the  verses  be  put  in  prose,  and 
then  ask  the  meaning,  and  it  will  be  found  that  one  verse 
did  but  beget  another,  without  ordering  at  the  first 
what  should  be  at  the  last ;  which  becomes  a  confused  25 
mass  of  words,  with  a  tinkling  sound  of  rime,  barely 
accompanied  with  reason. 

Our  tragedies  and  comedies  not  without  cause  cried 
out  against,  observing  rules  neither  of  honest  civility  nor 
of  skilful  poetry,  excepting  Gorboduc,  —  again  I  say  of  30 
those  that  I  have  seen.  Which  notwithstanding  as  it 
is  full  of  stately  speeches  and  well-sounding  phrases, 
climbing  to  the  height  of  Seneca's  style,  and  as  full  of 
notable  moraUty,  which  it  doth  most  delightfully  teach, 


Quicquid  conabar  dicere,  versus  erat; 


printed,  that  have  poetical  sinews 


48 


UNITIES  OF  PLACE  AND  TIME, 


and  so  obtain  the  very  end  of  poesy  ;  yet  in  truth  it  is 
very  defectious  m  the  circumstances,  which  grieveth  me, 
because  it  might  not  remain  as  an  exact  model  of  all 
tragedies.  For  it  is  faulty  both  in  place  and  tmie,  the 
5  two  necessary  companions  of  all  corporal  actions.  For 
where  the  stage  should  always  represent  but  one  place, 
and  the  uttermost  time  presupposed  in  it  should  be,  both 
by  Aristotle's  precept  and  common  reason,  but  one  day  ; 
there  is  both  many  days  and  many  places  inartificially 
lo  imagined. 

But  if  it  be  so  in  Gorboduc,  how  much  more  in  all 
the  rest?  where  you  shall  have  Asia  of  the  one  side,  and 
Afric  of  the  other,  and  so  many  other  under-kingdoms, 
that  the  player,  when  he  cometh  in,  must  ever  begin  with 

15  telling  where  he  is,  or  else  the  tale  will  not  be  conceived. 
Now  ye  shall  have  three  ladies  walk  to  gather  flowers, 
and  then  we  must  believe  the  stage  to  be  a  garden.  By 
and  by  we  hear  news  of  shipwreck  in  the  same  place, 
and  then  we  are  to  blame  if  we  accept  it  not  for  a  rock. 

20  Upon  the  back  of  that  comes  out  a  hideous  monster 
with  fire  and  smoke,  and  then  the  miserable  beholders 
are  bound  to  take  it  for  a  cave.  While  in  the  mean  time 
two  armies  fly  in,  represented  with  four  swords  and 
bucklers,  and  then  what  hard  heart  will  not  receive  it 

25  for  a  pitched  field  ? 

Now  of  time  they  are  much  more  liberal.  For  ordinary 
it  is  that  two  young  princes  fall  in  love  ;  after  many 
traverses  she  is  got  with  child,  delivered  of  a  fair  boy, 
he  is  lost,  groweth  a  man,  falleth  in  love,  and  is  ready  to 

30  get  another  child,  —  and  all  this  in  two  hours'  space  ; 
which  how  absurd  it  is  in  sense  even  sense  may  imag- 
ine, and  art  hath  taught,  and  all  ancient  examples  justi- 
fied, and  at  this  day  the  ordinary  players  in  Italy  will  not 
err  in.    Yet  will  some  bring  in  an  example  of  Eunuchus 

35  in  Terence,  that  containeth  matter  of  two  days,  yet  far 


UNITY  OF  ACTION.  49 

short  of  twenty  years.  True  it  is,  and  so  was  it  to  be 
played  in  two  days,  and  so  fitted  to  the  time  it  set  forth. 
And  though  Plautus  have  in  one  place  done  amiss,  let  us 
hit  with  him,  and  not  miss  with  him.  But  they  will 
say,  How  then  shall  we  set  forth  a  story  which  containeth  5 
both  many  places  and  many  times?  And  do  they  not 
know  that  a  tragedy  is  tied  to  the  laws  of  poesy,  and  not 
of  history ;  not  bound  to  follow  the  story,  but  having 
liberty  either  to  feign  a  quite  new  matter,  or  to  frame 
the  history  to  the  most  tragical  conveniency?  Again,  10 
many  things  may  be  told  which  cannot  be  showed,  —  if 
they  know  the  difference  betwixt  reporting  and  represent- 
ing. As  for  example  I  may  speak,  though  I  am  here,  of 
Peru,  and  in  speech  digress  from  that  to  the  description 
of  Calicut ;  but  in  action  I  cannot  represent  it  without  15 
Pacolet*s  horse.  And  so  was  the  manner  the  ancients 
took,  by  some  Nuntius  to  recount  things  done  in  former 
time  or  other  place. 

Lastly,  if  they  will  represent  a  history,  they  must  not, 
as  Horace  saith,  begin  ab  ovo,  but  they  must  come  to  20 
the  principal  point  of  that  one  action  which  they  will 
represent.  By  example  this  will  be  best  expressed.  I 
have  a  story  of  young  Polydorus,  delivered  for  safety's 
sake,  with  great  riches,  by  his  father  Priamus  to  Polym- 
nestor,  King  of  Thrace,  in  the  Trojan  war  time.  He,  25 
after  some  years,  hearing  the  overthrow  of  Priamus, 
for  to  make  the  treasure  his  own  murdereth  the  child ; 
the  body  of  the  child  is  taken  up  ;  Hecuba,  she,  the 
same  day,  findeth  a  sleight  to  be  revenged  most  cruelly 
of  the  tyrant.  Where  now  would  one  of  our  tragedy-  30 
writers  begin,  but  with  the  delivery  of  the  child  ?  Then 
should  he  sail  over  into  Thrace,  and  so  spend  I  know 
not  how  many  years,  and  travel  numbers  of  places.  But 
where  doth  Euripides?  Even  with  the  finding  of  the 
body,  leaving  the  rest  to  be  told  by  the  spirit  of  Poly-  35 


50        MINGLING  OF  TRAGEDY  AND  COMEDY. 

dorus.  This  needs  no  further  to  be  enlarged  ;  the  dullest 
wit  may  conceive  it. 

But,  besides  these  gross  absurdities,  how  all  their  plays 
be  neither  right  tragedies  nor  right  comedies,  mingling 

5  kings  and  clowns,  not  because  the  matter  so  carrieth  it, 
but  thrust  in  the  clown  by  head  and  shoulders  to  play 
a  part  in  majestical  matters,  with  neither  decency  nor 
discretion ;  so  as  neither  the  admiration  and  commisera- 
tion, nor  the  right  sportfulness,  is  by  their  mongrel  tragi- 

lo  comedy  obtained.  I  know  Apuleius  did  somewhat  so, 
but  that  is  a  thing  recounted  with  space  of  time,  not 
represented  in  one  moment ;  and  I  know  the  ancients 
have  one  or  two  examples  of  tragi-comedies,  as  Plautus 
hath  Amphytrio.    But,  if  we  mark  them  well,  we  shall 

15  find  that  they  never,  or  very  daintily,  match  hornpipes 
and  funerals.  So  falleth  it  out  that,  having  indeed  no 
right  comedy  in  that  comical  part  of  our  tragedy,  we 
have  nothing  but  scurriKty,  unworthy  of  any  chaste  ears, 
or  some  extreme  show  of  doltishness,  indeed  fit  to  lift 

20  up  a  loud  laughter,  and  nothing  else ;  where  the  whole 
tract  of  a  comedy  should  be  full  of  delight,  as  the  tragedy 
should  be  still  maintained  in  a  well-raised  admiration. 

But  our  comedians  think  there  is  no  delight  without 
laughter,  which  is  very  wrong ;  for  though  laughter  may 

25  come  with  delight,  yet  cometh  it  not  of  delight,  as 
though  dehght  should  be  the  cause  of  laughter ;  but  well 
may  one  thing  breed  both  together.  Nay,  rather  in  them- 
selves they  have,  as  it  were,  a  kind  of  contrariety.  For 
delight  we  scarcely  do,  but  in  things  that  have  a  con- 

30  veniency  to  ourselves,  or  to  the  general  nature  ;  laughter 
almost  ever  cometh  of  things  most  disproportioned  to 
ourselves  and  nature.  Delight  hath  a  joy  in  it  either 
permanent  or  present;  laughter  hath  only  a  scornful 
tickling.    For  example,  we  are  ravished  with  delight  to 

35  see  a  fair  woman,  and  yet  are  far  from  being  moved  to 


DELIGHT  OR  LAUGHTER? 


laughter.  We  laugh  at  deformed  creatures,  wherein  cer- 
tainly we  cannot  delight.  We  delight  in  good  chances, 
we  laugh  at  mischances.  We  delight  to  hear  the  happi- 
ness of  our  friends  and  country,  at  which  he  were  worthy 
to  be  laughed  at  that  would  laugh.  We  shall,  contrarily, 
laugh  sometimes  to  find  a  matter  quite  mistaken  and  go 
down  the  hill  against  the  bias,  in  the  mouth  of  some  such 
men,  as  for  the  respect  of  them  one  shall  be  heartily 
sorry  he  cannot  choose  but  laugh,  and  so  is  rather  pained 
than  delighted  with  laughter.  Yet  deny  I  not  but  that 
they  may  go  well  together.  For  as  in  Alexander's  picture 
well  set  out  we  dehght  without  laughter,  and  in  twenty 
mad  antics  we  laugh  without  delight ;  so  in  Hercules, 
painted,  with  his  great  beard  and  furious  countenance,  in 
woman's  attire,  spinning  at  Omphale's  commandment, 
it  breedeth  both  delight  and  laughter  ;  for  the  representing 
of  so  strange  a  power  in  love,  procureth  delight,  and  the 
scornfulness  of  the  action  stirreth  laughter. 

But  I  speak  to  this  purpose,  that  all  the  end  of  the 
comical  part  be  not  upon  such  scornful  matters  as  stir 
laughter  only,  but  mixed  with  it  that  delightful  teaching 
which  is  the  end  of  poesy.  And  the  great  fault,  even  in 
that  point  of  laughter,  and  forbidden  plainly  by  Aristotle, 
is  that  they  stir  laughter  in  sinful  things,  which  are  rather 
execrable  than  ridiculous  ;  or  in  miserable,  which  are 
rather  to  be  pitied  than  scorned.  For  what  is  it  to  make 
folks  gape  at  a  wretched  beggar  or  a  beggarly  clown, 
or,  against  law  of  hospitality,  to  jest  at  strangers  because 
they  speak  not  English  so  well  as  we  do?  what  do  we 
learn  ?  since  it  is  certain  : 

Nil  habet  infelix  paupertas  durius  in  se, 
Quam  quod  ridicules  homines  facit. 

But  rather  a  busy  loving  courtier  ;  a  heartless  threatening 
Thraso ;  a  self-wise-seeming  schoolmaster ;  a  wry-trans- 


52 


AFFECTATION  IN  LOVE  POEMS. 


formed  traveller :  these  if  we  saw  walk  in  stage-names, 
which  we  play  naturally,  therein  were  delightful  laugh- 
ter and  teaching  delightfulness,  —  as  in  the  other,  the  trage- 
dies of  Buchanan  do  justly  bring  forth  a  divine  admiration. 
5  But  I  have  lavished  out  too  many  words  of  this  play- 
matter.  I  do  it,  because  as  they  are  excelling  parts  of 
poesy7  so  is  there  none  so  much  used  in  England,  and 
none  can  be  more  pitifully  abused  ;  which,  like  an  unman- 
nerly daughter,  showing  a  bad  education,  causeth  her 

lo  mother  Poesy's  honesty  to  be  called  in  question. 

Other  sorts  of  poetry  almost  have  we  none,  but  that 
lyrical  kind  of  songs  and  sonnets,  which,  Lord  if  he 
gave  us  so  good  minds,  how  well  it  might  be  employed, 
and  with  how  heavenly  fruits  both  private  and  public,  in 

15  singing  the  praises  of  the  immortal  beauty,  the  immortal 
goodness  of  that  God  who  giveth  us  hands  to  write,  and 
wits  to  conceive  !  —  of  which  we  might  well  want  words, 
but  never  matter ;  of  which  we  could  turn  our  eyes  to 
nothing,  but  we  should  ever  have  new-budding  occasions. 

20  But  truly,  many  of  such  writings  as  come  under  the 
banner  of  unresistible  love,  if  I  were  a  mistress  would 
never  persuade  me  they  were  in  love ;  so  coldly  they 
apply  fiery  speeches,  as  men  that  had  rather  read  lovers* 
writings,  and  so  caught  up  certain  swelling  phrases — which 

25  hang  together  like  a  man  which  once  told  me  the  wind 
was  at  north-west  and  by  south,  because  he  would  be 
sure  to  name  winds  enough  —  than  that  in  truth  they 
feel  those  passions,  which  easily,  as  I  think,  may  be 
bewrayed  by  that  same  forcibleness,  or  ejiergia  (as  the 

30  Greeks  call  it)  of  the  writer.  But  let  this  be  a  sufficient, 
though  short  note,  that  we  miss  the  right  use  of  the 
material  point  of  poesy. 

Now  for  the  outside  of  it,  which  is  words,  or  (as  I  may 
term  it)  diction,  it  is  even  well  worse,  so  is  that  honey- 

35  flowing  matron  eloquence  apparelled,  or  rather  disguised, 


EUPHUISM  IN  PROSE. 


53 


in  a  courtesan-like  painted  affectation  :  one  time  with  so 
far-fet  words,  that  many  seem  monsters  —  but  must  seem 
strangers  —  to  any  poor  Englishman;  another  time  with 
coursing  of  a  letter,  as  if  they  were  bound  to  follow  the 
method  of  a  dictionary ;  another  time  with  figures  and  5 
flowers  extremely  winter-starved. 

But  I  would  this  fault  were  only  peculiar  to  versifiers, 
and  had  not  as  large  possession  among  prose-printers, 
and,  which  is  to  be  marvelled,  among  many  scholars, 
and,  which  is  to  be  pitied,  among  some  preachers.  Truly  10 
I  could  wish  —  if  at.  least  I  might  be  so  bold  to  wish  in 
a  thing  beyond  the  reach  of  my  capacity —  the  diligent 
imitators  of  Tully  and  Demosthenes  (most  worthy  to  be 
imitated)  did  not  so  much  keep  Nizolian  paper-books  of 
their  figures  and  phrases,  as  by  attentive  translation,  as  is 
it  were  devour  them  whole,  and  make  them  wholly  theirs. 
For  now  they  cast  sugar  and  spice  upon  every  dish  that 
is  served  to  the  table ;  like  those  Indians,  not  content  to 
wear  ear-rings  at  the  fit  and  natural  place  of  the  ears, 
but  they  will  thrust  jewels  through  their  nose  and  lips,  20 
because  they  will  be  sure  to  be  fine.  Tully,  when  he 
was  to  drive  out  Catiline  as  it  were  with  a  thunderbolt 
of  eloquence,  often  used  that  figure  of  repetition,  as 
Vivit.  Vivit?  Lnmo  vera  etiatn  in  senatum  venit,  etc. 
Indeed,  inflamed  with  a  well-grounded  rage,  he  would  25 
have  his  words,  as  it  were,  double  out  of  his  mouth ; 
and  so  do  that  artificially,  which  we  see  men  in  choler 
do  naturally.  And  we,  having  noted  the  grace  of  those 
words,  hale  them  in  sometime  to  a  familiar  epistle,  when 
it  were  too  much  choler  to  be  choleric.  How  well  30 
store  of  si77iiliter  cadences  doth  sound  with  the  gravity 
of  the  pulpit,  I  would  but  invoke  Demosthenes'  soul  to 
tell,  who  with  a  rare  daintiness  useth  them.  Truly  they 
have  made  me  think  of  the  sophister  that  with  too  much 
subtiUty  would  prove  two  eggs  three,  and  though  he  35 


54  DANCING  TO  ONE'S  OWN  MUSIC. 


might  be  counted  a  sophister,  had  none  for  his  labor. 
So  these  men  bringing  in  such  a  kind  of  eloquence,  well 
may  they  obtain  an  opinion  of  a  seeming  fineness,  but 
persuade  few,  —  which  should  be  the  end  of  their  fineness. 
5  Now  for  similitudes  in  certain  printed  discourses,  I 
think  all  herbarists,  all  stories  of  beasts,  fowls,  and  fishes 
are  rifled  up,  that  they  may  come  in  multitudes  to  wait 
upon  any  of  our  conceits,  which  certainly  is  as  absurd 
a  surfeit  to  the  ears  as  is  possible.    For  the  force  of  a 

lo  similitude  not  being  to  prove  any  thing  to  a  contrary  dis- 
puter,  but  only  to  explain  to  a  willing  hearer ;  when  that 
is  done,  the  rest  is  a  most  tedious  prattling,  rather  over- 
swaying  the  memory  from  the  purpose  whereto  they  were 
applied,  than  any  whit  informing  the  judgment,  already 

15  either  satisfied  or  by  similitudes  not  to  be  satisfied. 

For  my  part,  I  do  not  doubt,  when  Antonius  and 
Crassus,  the  great  forefathers  of  Cicero  in  eloquence,  the 
one  (as  Cicero  testifieth  of  them)  pretended  not  to 
know  art,  the  other  not  to  set  by  it,  because  with  a  plain 

20  sensibleness  they  might  win  credit  of  popular  ears,  which 
credit  is  the  nearest  step  to  persuasion,  which  persua- 
sion is  the  chief  mark  of  oratory,  —  I  do  not  doubt,  I 
say,  but  that  they  used  these  knacks  very  sparingly ; 
which  who  doth  generally  use  any  man  may  see  doth 

25  dance  to  his  own  music,  and  so  be  noted  by  the  audi- 
ence more  careful  to  speak  curiously  than  truly.  Un- 
doubtedly (at  least  to  my  opinion  undoubtedly)  I  have 
found  in  divers  small-learned  courtiers  a  more  sound 
style  than  in  some  professors  of  learning ;  of  which  I 

30  can  guess  no  other  cause,  but  that  the  courtier  following 
that  which  by  practice  he  findeth  fittest  to  nature,  therein, 
though  he  know  it  not,  doth  according  to  art,  though 
not  by  art ;  where  the  other,  using  art  to  show  art  and 
not  to  hide  art  —  as  in  these  cases  he  should  do  —  flieth 

35  from  nature,  and  indeed  abuseth  art. 


THE  ENGLISH  LANGUAGE  PRAISED,  55 


But  what !  me  thinks  I  deserve  to  be  pounded  for  stray- 
ing from  poetry  to  oratory.  But  both  have  such  an  affinity 
in  the  wordish  consideration,  that  I  think  this  digression 
will  make  my  meaning  receive  the  fuller  understanding  :  — 
which  is  not  to  take  upon  me  to  teach  poets  how  they  5 
should  do,  but  only,  finding  myself  sick  among  the  rest, 
to  show  some  one  or  two  spots  of  the  common  infection 
grown  among  the  most  part  of  writers ;  that,  acknowl- 
edging ourselves  somewhat  awry,  we  may  bend  to  the 
right  use  both  of  matter  and  manner :  whereto  our  Ian-  10 
guage  giveth  us  great  occasion,  being,  indeed,  capable  of 
any  excellent  exercising  of  it. 

I  know  some  will  say  it  is  a  mingled  language.  And 
why  not  so  much  the  better,  taking  the  best  of  both 
the  other?    Another  will  say  it  wanteth  grammar.    Nay,  15 
truly,  it  hath  that  praise  that  it  wanteth  not  grammar. 
For  grammar  it  might  have,  but  it  needs  it  not ;  being 
so  easy  in  itself,  and  so  void  of  those  cumbersome  dif- 
ferences of  cases,  genders,  moods,  and  tenses,  which,  I 
think,  was  a  piece  of  the  Tower  of  Babylon's  curse,  that  20 
a  man  should  be  put  to  school   to  learn  his  mother- 
tongue.    But  for  the  uttering  sweetly  and  properly  the 
conceits  of  the  mind,  which  is  the  end  of  speech,  that 
hath  it  equally  with  any  other  tongue  in  the  world ;  and 
is  particularly  happy  in  compositions  of  two  or  three  words  25 
together,  near  the  Greek,  far  beyond  the  Latin,  —  which 
is  one  of  the  greatest  beauties  can  be  in  a  language. 

Now  of  versifying  there  are  two  sorts,  the  one  ancient, 
the  other  modern.  The  ancient  marked  the  quantity  of 
each  syllable,  and  according  to  that  framed  his  verse ;  30 
the  modern  observing  only  number,  with  some  regard  of 
the  accent,  the  chief  life  of  it  standeth  in  that  like  sound- 
ing of  the  words,  which  we  call  rime.  Whether  of 
these  be  the  more  excellent  would  bear  many  speeches ; 
the  ancient  no  doubt  more  fit  for  music,  both  words  35 


56  QUANTITY,  ACCENT,  AND  RIME. 

and  tune  observing  quantity ;  and  more  fit  lively  to  ex- 
press divers  passions,  by  the  low  or  lofty  sound  of  the 
well-weighed  syllable.  The  latter  likewise  with  his  rime 
striketh  a  certain  music  to  the  ear ;  and,  in  fine,  since 
5  it  doth  delight,  though  by  another  way,  it  obtaineth  the 
same  purpose ;  there  being  in  either,  sweetness,  and 
wanting  in  neither,  majesty.  Truly  the  English,  before 
any  other  vulgar  language  I  know,  is  fit  for  both  sorts. 
For,  for  the  ancient,  the  Italian  is  so  full  of  vowels  that 

lo  it  must  ever  be  cumbered  with  elisions ;  the  Dutch  so, 
of  the  other  side,  with  consonants,  that  they  cannot  yield 
the  sweet  sliding  fit  for  a  verse.  The  French  in  his 
whole  language  hath  not  one  word  that  hath  his  accent  in 
the  last  syllable  saving  two,  called  antepenultima,  and  little 

15  more  hath  the  Spanish ;  and  therefore  very  gracelessly 
may  they  use  dactyls.  The  English  is  subject  to  none 
of  these  defects.  Now  for  rime,  though  we  do  not  ob- 
serve quantity,  yet  we  observe  the  accent  very  precisely, 
which  other  languages  either  cannot  do,  or  will  not  do 

20  so  absolutely.  That  caesura,  or  breathing-place  in  the 
midst  of  the  verse,  neither  Italian  nor  Spanish  have,  the 
French  and  we  never  almost  fail  of. 

Lastly,  even  the  very  rime  itself  the  Itahan  cannot 
put  in  the  last  syllable,  by  the  French  named  the  mas- 

25  culine  rime,  but  still  in  the  next  to  the  last,  which  the 
French  call  the  female,  or  the  next  before  that,  which 
the  Italians  term  sdrucciola.  The  example  of  the  former 
is  huono  :  suono  ;  of  the  sdrucciola  is  feifiina  :  semina. 
The  French,  of  the  other  side,  hath  both  the  male,  as 

30  don  :  son,  and  the  female,  as  plaise  :  taise ;  but  the 
sdrucciola  he  hath  not.  Where  the  English  hath  all 
three,  as  due  :  truCy  father  :  rather ,  motion  :  potion  ; 
with  much  more  which  might  be  said,  but  that  already  I 
find  the  triflingness  of  this  discourse  is  much  too  much 

35  enlarged. 


THIRD  SUMMARY. 


57 


So  that  since  the  ever  praiseworthy  poesy  is  full  of  virtue- 
breeding  delightfulness,  and  void  of  no  gift  that  ought  to  be 
in  the  noble  name  of  learning ;  since  the  blames  laid  against 
it  are  either  false  or  feeble ;  since  the  cause  why  it  is  not 
esteemed  in  England  is  the  fault  of  poet-apes,  not  poets;  5 
since,  lastly,  our  tongue  is  most  fit  to  honor  poesy,  and  to  be 
honored  by  poesy ;  I  conjure  you  all  that  have  had  the  evil 
luck  to  read  this  ink-wasting  toy  of  mine,  even  in  the  name 
of  the  Nine  Muses,  no  more  to  scorn  the  sacred  mysteries  of 
poesy ;  no  more  to  laugh  at  the  name  of  poets,  as  though  10 
they  were  next  inheritors  to  fools  ;  no  more  to  jest  at  the 
reverend  title  of  a  rimer  " ;  but  to  believe,  with  Aristotle, 
that  they  were  the  ancient  treasurers  of  the  Grecians'  divin- 
ity ;  to  believe,  with  Bembus,  that  they  were  first  bringers- 
in  of  all  civility;  to  believe,  with  Scaliger,  that  no  philoso-  15' 
pher's  precepts  can  sooner  make  you  an  honest  man  than  the 
reading  of  Yirgil ;  to  believe,  with  Olauserus,  the  translator 
of  Cornutus,  that  it  pleased  the  Heavenly  Deity  by  Hesiod 
and  Homer,  under  the  veil  of  fables,  to  give  us  all  knowl- 
edge, logic,  rhetoric,  philosophy  natural  and  moral,  and  20 
quid  71071  ?  to  believe,  with  me,  that  there  are  many 
mysteries  contained  in  poetry  which  of  purpose  were  writ- 
ten darkly,  lest  by  profane  wits  it  should  be  abused ;  to 
believe,  with  Landino,  that  they  are  so  beloved  of  the  gods, 
that  whatsoever  they  write  proceeds  of  a  divine  fury ;  lastly,  25 
to  believe  themselves,  when  they  tell  you  they  will  make 
you  immortal  by  their  verses. 

Thus  doing,  your  name  shall  flourish  in  the  printers' 
shops.  Thus  doing,  you  shall  be  of  kin  to  many  a  poeti- 
cal preface.  Thus  doing,  you  shall  be  most  fair,  most  rich,  30 
most  wise,  most  all;  you  shall  dwell  upon  superlatives. 
Thus  doing,  though  you  be  liberti7to  patre  7tatus,  you  shall 
suddenly  grow  Herculea  proles, 


Si  quid  mea  carmina  possunt. 


58 


HUMOROUS  PERORATION. 


Thus  doing,  your  soul  shall  be  placed  with  Dante's  Bea- 
trice or  Virgil's  Anchises. 

But  if — fie  of  such  a  but  !  —  you  be  born  so  near  the 
dull-making  cataract  of  Nilus,  that  you  cannot  hear  the 

5  planet-like  music  of  poetry ;  if  you  have  so  earth-creep- 
ing a  mind  that  it  cannot  lift  itself  up  to  look  to  the  sky 
of  poetry,  or  rather,  by  a  certain  rustical  disdain,  will 
become  such  a  mome  as  to  be  a  Momus  of  poetry; 
then,  though  I  will  not  wish  unto  you  the  ass's  ears  of 

lo  Midas,  nor  to  be  driven  by  a  poet's  verses,  as  Bubonax 
was,  to  hang  himself ;  nor  to  be  rimed  to  death,  as  is 
said  to  be  done  in  Ireland ;  yet  thus  much  curse  I  must 
send  you  in  the  behalf  of  all  poets  :  —  that  while  you  live 
you  live  in  love,  and  never  get  favor  for  lacking  skill  of 

15  a  sonnet ;  and  when  you  die,  your  memory  die  from  the 
earth  for  want  of  an  epitaph. 


NOTES. 


1 1.  Edward  Wotton.  One  of  Sidney's  dearest  friends,  whom  he 
remembered  in  the  will  made  on  his  death-bed,  and  who  was  one  of  the 
four  pall-bearers  at  his  funeral. 

1  2.  Emperor's.    Maximilian  II.  ( 1 527-15 76). 

1  3.  Horsefnanship.  This  was  in  the  winter  of  1574-75,  when  Sidney 
had  just  arrived  at  the  age  of  20.  That  Sidney  profited  by  these  lessons 
in  horsemanship  is  apparent  from  his  own  statement  in  the  41st  sonnet 
of  Astrophel  and  Stella,  written,  as  Pollard,  one  of  his  latest  editors, 
thinks,  in  April  or  May,  1581  : 

Having  this  day  my  horse,  my  hand,  my  lance 
Guided  so  well  that  I  obtained  the  prize. 
Both  by  the  judgment  of  the  English  eyes 
And  of  some  sent  from  that  sweet  enemy  France, 
Horsemen  my  skill  in  horsemanship  advance, 
Town-folks  my  strength. 

The  year  before  he  had  given  this  advice  to  his  brother  Robert : 
"  At  horsemanship,  when  you  exercise  it,  read  Crison  Claudio,  and  a 
book  that  is  called  La  Gloria  del  Cavallo  withal,  that  you  may  join 
the  thorough  contemplation  of  it  with  the  exercise;  and  so  shall  you 
profit  more  in  a  month  than  others  in  a  year,  and  mark  the  bitting, 
saddling  and  curing  of  horses  "  (Fox  Bourne,  Memoir,  p.  278).  Cf.  also 
Sonnets  49  and  53  of  Astrophel  and  Stella, 

1 6.  Wit.  A  favorite  word  with  Sidney.  Used  in  the  singular, 
7  34,  8  26,  834,  10  14,  12  1,  13  35,  32  25,  3  7  8,30,31,  43  14,  44  7,8,18,19, 
46  1,  24,  50  2;  in  the  plural,  3  4,  4  30,  5  31,  39  8,  42  4,  44  32,  52  17.  Cf. 
also  fine-witted,  14  13. 

1  10.  Loaden.  Cf.  13  28.  Dr.  J.  A.  H.  Murray  kindly  informs  me  that 
this  form  of  the  past  participle  is  found  as  early  as  1545,  in  Brinklow's 
Lamentacyon  (E.  E.  T.  S.  Extra  Ser.  No.  22),  p.  82,  in  the  translation 
of  Matt.  II.  28.  From  this  time  onward,  for  a  hundred  years,  it  is 
common,  being  found  several  times  in  Shakespeare  and  Milton,  as  well 


60 


NOTES. 


as  in  more  obscure  authors.  It  is  still  in  use  at  the  close  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  as,  for  example,  in  Ann  Radcliffe's  Journey  made 
in  the  Summer  of  17^4.  Sterne  {^Sentiuiental  Journey^  Auiiens)  even 
treats  it  as  the  infinitive  of  a  weak  verb :  "  he  had  loaden'd  himself." 
Perhaps  it  is  at  present  restricted  to  the  Scotch  dialect.  The  Scotch 
steward  in  Robert  Louis  Stevenson's  Master  of  Ballantrae  speaks  of 
a  ship  as  being  "  too  deeply  loaden."  The  last  three  references  I  owe 
to  Mr.  Ralph  O.  Williams  of  New  Haven. 

1  12.  He  said  soldiers^  etc.  That  is  frequently  omitted  at  the  begin- 
ning of  object  clauses.  Cf.  1  14,  8  14,  9  7,  15  34,  32  5,  3  7  3, 11, 12,  40  10, 
41  16,  43  31,  50  10, 12,  23,  53  7, 11,  54  6,  5  5  3, 13, 15. 

1 19.  Pedanteria.    Piece  of  pedantry. 

1  24.  A  piece.    Or,  as  we  say  colloquially,  "  a  bit."    Cf.  45  18. 

Logician.  See  the  Retr.  Reviezv,  10.  45  :  "  Sir  Philip  Sidney,  in  the 
opening  paragraph  of  his  essay,  gives  himself  out  as  *  a  piece  of  a 
logician';  and,  in  fact,  the  Defense  of  Poesy  may  be  regarded  as 
a  logical  discourse  from  beginning  to  end,  ir^ferspersed  here  and  there 
with  a  few  of  the  more  flowery  parts  of  eloquence,  but  everywhere 
keeping  in  view  the  main  objects  of  all  logic  and  of  all  eloquence,  — 
namely,  proof  and  persuasion.  It  is,  in  fact,  —  contrary  to  the  general 
notion  that  prevails  concerning  it  in  the  minds  of  those  who  do  not 
take  the  trouble  of  judging  for  themselves,  —  a  sober  and  serious  dis- 
quisition, almost  entirely  rejecting  the  '  foreign  aid  of  ornament,'  and 
equally  free  from  dogmatism  and  declamation." 

1  25.   To  have  wished.    A  construction  no  longer  favored. 

1  26.  A  horse.  Sidney's  humor  is  quiet,  but  unmistakable.  Other 
instances  may  be  found  in  2026-8,  31  11-13,  35  29-31,  3823,  48 11  fl.,  583-16. 

1  27.  Drave.    Cf.  2  25,  stale,  4  10  (Ponsonby's  ed.),  strave,  27  7,  41  17. 

2  6.  Unelected.  Sidney,  like  Milton  in  his  prose,  is  partial  to  adjec- 
tives (past  participles),  with  the  negative  prefix  un.  See  30  8,  52  21. 
Unelected  vocation.    Cf.  Sonnet  74  of  Astrophel  and  Stella  : 

I  never  drank  of  Aganippe  well, 

Nor  ever  did  in  shade  of  Tempe  sit, 

And  Muses  scorn  with  vulgar  brains  to  dwell; 

Poor  layman  I,  for  sacred  rites  unfit. 

Some  do  I  hear  of  poets'  fury  tell, 

But,  God  wot,  wot  not  what  they  mean  by  it. 

See  also  46  3  ff. 

210-13.  As  .  .  .  so.  For  this  construction,  cf.  4  35,  15  7-8,  16  5-16, 
24  22-23,  28  5-7  ,  29  32,  30  3-4,  8-9,  32  20-23  ,  36  12,  38  26-7,  39  32-3, 
45  14-17,  46  9,  23,  52  6-7. 


NOTES. 


61 


215.  Silly,  Nearly  =  poor,  as  used  in  2  11.  Cf.  Shak.,  2  Hen.  VI. 
I.  I.  225-6 : 

While  as  the  silly  owner  of  the  goods 

Weeps  over  them  and  wrings  his  hapless  hands. 

Names  of  philosophers.    Meaning  Plato  :  35  6,  40  33. 

2  16.  The  defacing  of  it.  Sidney  sometimes  construes  the  verbal 
noun  with  a  following  of  as  here,  and  sometimes  directly  with  the 
object,  the  preposition  being  omitted.  Examples  of  the  former  are : 
4  1,  4  11,  5  34-5,  6  13-14,  12  1,  13  26,  16  15-16,  32  32,  33  32,  44  6,  47  16-17, 
49  34.  For  the  latter,  see  3  35,  4  2,  5  21,  6  12-13,  11  22-23,  12  19,  27  16-17, 
30  26,  30  34-35,  32  19,  55  22-23. 

2  18.  And  first,  etc.  Puttenham's  Art  of  English  Poesy  follows,  for 
its  first  five  chapters,  with  the  exception  of  the  second,  much  the  same 
lines  as  Sidney  in  his  opening. 

2  23.  Eirst  nurse.  So  Harington  (Haslewood,  2.  121):  "The  very 
first  nurse  and  ancient  grandmother  of  all  learning." 

2  24-27.  Sidney  elsewhere  condemns  such  similitudes  (54  5  ff.),  and 
is  perhaps  only  employing  them  here  for  an  humorous  purpose,  and  in 
allusion  to  the  excessive  use  of  them  by  Gosson,  who,  in  fact,  introduces 
the  adder  in  his  School  of  Abuse  (p.  46)  :  "  The  adder's  death  is  her  own 
brood." 

2  25.  Hedgehog.  Prof.  T.  F.  Crane  of  Cornell  University  refers  me  to 
Kirchhof  s  We7tdunmtith,  a  German  collection  of  fables  {Bibl.  des  litt. 
Vereins  in  Stuttgart,  Bd.  98),  where  the  story  is  given  (7.  74).  It  is 
also  said  to  be  found  in  Camerarius'  edition  of  i4^sop,  Leipsic,  1564, 
and  elsewhere  (cf.  Regnier's  La  Fontaine,  i.  146,  in  Hachette's  Les 
Grands  Ecrivains  de  la  Erance).  1  have  also  found  it  in  a  school 
edition  (p.  90)  of  ALsop'^s  Eables,  published  by  Ginn  &  Co.  in  their 
"  Classics  for  Children." 

2  26.  Vipers,  Referring  to  Pliny's  Natural  History,  10.  82.  2  :  "On 
the  third  day  it  hatches  its  young  in  the  uterus,  and  then  excludes  them, 
one  every  day,  and  generally  twenty  in  number.  The  last  ones  become 
so  impatient  of  their  confinement  that  they  force  a  passage  through 
the  sides  of  their  parent,  and  so  kill  her."  Again  used  by  Daniel, 
Apology  for  Rime  (Haslewood,  2.  209)  :  "  But  this  innovation,  like  a 
viper,  must  ever  make  way  into  the  world's  opinion  through  the  bowels 
of  her  own  breeding."    Cf.  Englische  Studien  14.  195-6. 

2  29.  Musccus,  Homer,  and  Hesiod.  Plato  thus  groups  these  names 
near  the  close  of  his  Apology  (41 ;  Jowett  i.  374)  :  "  What  would  not  a 
man  give  if  he  might  converse  with  Orpheus  and  Musaeus  and  Hesiod 
and  Homer?" 


62 


NOTES, 


For  Mus9eus,  see  Mahaffy,  Hist.  Grk.  Lit.  i.  14:  "This  Musseus  was 
supposed  to  have  been  a  pupil  or  successor  to  Orpheus."  On  Hesiod, 
cf.  Mahaffy,  i.  98-99:  "It  is  an  admitted  fact  that,  about  the  begin- 
ning of  the  seventh  century  B.C.,  the  heroic  epics  of  the  Greeks 
were  being  supplanted  by  the  poetry  of  real  life  —  iambic  satire,  elegiac 
confessions,  gnomic  wisdom,  and  proverbial  philosophy.  The  Greeks 
grew  tired  of  all  the  praise  of  courts  and  ladies  and  bygone  wars,  and 
turned  to  a  sober  —  nay  even  exaggerated  —  realism,  by  way  of  reaction 
from  the  worship  of  Homeric  rhapsody.  The  father  and  forerunner  of 
all  this  school  is  clearly  Hesiod." 

2  30.  That  can  say,  etc.  Thus  Shelley,  in  his  Defense  of  Poetry  : 
"  In  the  infancy  of  society  every  author  is  necessarily  a  poet,  because 
language  itself  is  poetry."  And  again:  "They  are  the  institutors  of 
laws  and  the  founders  of  civil  society,  and  the  inventors  of  the  arts  of 
life,  and  the  teachers,  who  draw  into  a  certain  propinquity  with  the 
beautiful  and  the  true  that  partial  apprehension  of  the  agencies  of  the 
invisible  world  which  is  called  religion." 

2  32.  Orpheus,  Linus.  These,  like  Musseus,  and  perhaps  Hesiod 
and  Homer,  are  semi-mythical  personages.  In  discussing  the  legends 
concerning  them  Mahaffy  says  (^Hist.  Grk.  Lit.  I.  10)  :  "But  the  very 
fact  of  the  forging  of  the  name  of  Orpheus,  Musaeus,  and  others  proves 
clearly  the  antiquity  of  these  names,  and  that  the  poetry  ascribed  to 
them  was  of  a  character  quite  different  from  that  of  the  Epos.  The 
very  frequent  allusions  of  Plato,  on  the  other  hand,  who  even  in  three 
places  quotes  the  words  of  Orpheus,  show  clearly  that  he  accepted 
Orpheus  and  Musseus,  whom  he  usually  co-ordinates,  as  ancient  masters 
of  religious  song,  and  on  a  par  with  Homer  and  Hesiod.  This  general 
acceptance  of  Orpheus  as  a  real  personage,  with  no  less  frequent  sus- 
picions as  to  the  genuineness  of  the  current  Orphic  books,  appears  in 
other  Greek  writers;  e.g.  Aristotle  cites  the  so-called  Orphic  poems, 
just  as  he  cites  the  so-called  Pythagorean  books.  Apart  from  these 
casual  allusions,  our  really  explicit  authorities  are  the  antiquaries  of 
later  days,  to  whom  we  owe  almost  all  the  definite  knowledge  we 
possess.  Pausanias,  in  particular,  not  only  speaks  constantly  of  these 
poets,  but  refers  to  some  of  their  hymns  which  he  had  heard,  and  it  is 
he  and  Strabo  who  afford  us  the  materials  for  constructing  a  general 
theory  about  them." 

Of  Linus,  Mahaffy  says  (i.  14)  :  "There  are  other  names  which  Pau- 
sanias considers  still  older  —  Linus,  the  personification  of  the  Linus 
song  mentioned  by  Homer,  and  from  early  times  identified  more  or  less 
with  the  Adonis  song  of  the  Phoenicians  and  the  Maneros  of  the 
Egyptians." 


NOTES. 


63 


3  1-2.    Not  only  .  .  .  but.    Cf.  8  21-2,  26 12-14,  32  14-15,  33  20-21. 

3  5.  Amp/lion.  Cf.  Horace,  Art  of  Poetry  391-6:  "Once  in  the 
woods  men  lived  ;  then  holy  Orpheus,  heaven's  interpreter,  turned 
them  from  slaughter  and  their  foul  manner  of  life;  hence  he  was  said 
to  have  soothed  tigers  and  ravening  lions;  hence  too  it  was  said  that 
Amphion,  founder  of  the  Theban  citadel,  moved  rocks  to  the  strains  of 
his  lyre,  and  led  them  by  alluring  persuasion  whithersoever  he  listed." 

Addressing  Stella,  in  Sonnet  68  of  Astrophel  and  Stella,  Sidney 
writes : 

Why  dost  thou  spend  the  treasure  of  thy  sprite 
With  voice  more  fit  to  wed  Amphion's  lyre? 

In  the  third  of  his  Sonnets  of  Variable  Verse,  Sidney  again  couples 
Orpheus  and  Amphion : 

If  Orpheus'  voice  had  force  to  breathe  such  music's  love 
Through  pores  of  senseless  trees,  as  it  could  make  them  move ; 
If  stones  good  measure  danced  the  Theban  walls  to  build, 
To  cadence  of  the  tunes  which  Amphion's  lyre  did  yield, 

More  cause  a  like  effect  at  leastwise  bringeth. 

O  stones,  O  trees,  learn  hearing,  Stella  singeth. 

3  7.    Beasts.    Cf.  18  18,  37  19. 

3  8.  Livius  A7tdronicus.  About  284-204  B.C.  Cf.  Simcox,  Hist. 
Lat.  Lit.  I.  19:  "The  first  Latin  playwright,  the  first  schoolmaster  who 
taught  Greek  literature.  .  .  .  Perhaps  his  most  considerable  work  was 
a  school-book,  an  abridgment  of  the  Odyssey  in  the  saturnian  metre." 
Ennius.  239-169  B.C.  Cf.  Simcox,  I.  22:  "Throughout  the  republi- 
can period  he  was  recognized  as  the  great  Roman  poet.  Cicero  appeals 
to  him  as  sujiimus  poeta.  Lucretius  speaks  of  the  doctrines  of  the 
world  to  come  which  he  had  enshrined  in  everlasting  verse." 

3  8  ff.  Cf.  Shelley,  Defense  of  Poetjy  :  "  The  age  immediately  suc- 
ceeding to  that  of  Dante,  Petrarch,  and  Boccaccio  was  characterized  by 
a  revival  of  painting,  sculpture,  and  architecture.  Chaucer  caught  the 
sacred  inspiration,  and  the  superstructure  of  English  literature  is  based 
upon  the  materials  of  Italian  invention." 

313.    Others.    Cf.  47  6  ff. 

3  18.  Masks  of  poets.  Cf.  Mahaffy,  Hist.  Grk.  Lit.  I.  186-7  :  "  While 
education  and  consequently  literature  were  being  more  and  more  dis- 
seminated, prose  had  not  yet  been  adopted  as  a  vehicle  of  thought,  and 
thus  the  whole  intellectual  outcome  of  the  nation  took  the  form  of 
verse.  Much  of  what  remains  is  indeed  prosaic  in  idea.  .  .  .  The 
wisdom  of  Phokylides  and  of  Theognis  is  not  half  so  poetical  as  Plato's 


64 


NOTES. 


prose.  But  the  Greeks  awoke  very  slowly,  as  is  well  known,  to  the 
necessity  of  laying  aside  metre  in  writing  for  the  public,  and  even  when 
they  did,  we  shall  find  their  prose  never  shaking  off  a  painful  attention 
to  rhythm."  So  likewise  Moulton,  Ancient  Classical  Dratna^  p.  121  : 
"  In  all  literatures  poetry  is  at  the  outset  the  sole  medium  of  expression; 
with  the  advance  of  scientific  thought  a  second  medium  is  elaborated, 
but  the  transference  of  topics  from  poetry  to  prose  is  only  gradual." 

3  18.  Thales.  See  Mahaffy,  Hist.  Grk.  Lit,  2.  7 :  "  Neither  Thales 
nor  Pythagoras  left  anything  written,  and  it  is  remarkable  that  Xeno- 
phanes,  though  he  was  a  great  adversary  of  the  poets  and  of  public 
opinion  in  general,  and  led  the  conflict  between  philosophy  and  poetry, 
nevertheless  employed,  not  only  the  poetic  form,  but  even  the  poetic 
habit  of  public  recitation,  to  disseminate  his  views." 

E77ipedocles.  Cf.  Mahaffy,  I.  125  :  "  Mr.  Symonds,  in  his  essay  on  the 
poet,  goes  so  far  as  to  call  him  the  Greek  Shelley,  and  gives  some 
striking  grounds  for  this  singular  judgment.  As  a  poet,  therefore, 
Empedocles  must  be  ranked  very  high,  and  Cicero  expressly  tells  us 
that  his  verses  were  far  superior  to  those  of  Xenophanes  and  Parmen- 
ides,  themselves  no  mean  artists  on  similar  subjects."  See  also  Matthew 
Arnold's  poem,  Empedocles  on  Etna. 

3  19.  Parmenides.  Cf.  Mahaffy,  i.  123:  "  It  seems  more  likely  that 
Parmenides  came  earlier,  perhaps  about  the  opening  of  the  fifth  cen- 
tury, and  he  still  adhered  in  philosophy  to  the  old  didactic  epic,  which 
had  been  consecrated  to  serious  teaching  by  Hesiod  and  his  school." 

3  20.    Pythagoras.    Cf.  3  18,  above. 

Phocy tides.  Of  him  Mahaffy  says.  Hist.  Grk.  Lit.  i.  188:  "  He  imi- 
tates Simonides  in  satirising  women  by  comparing  them  to  domestic 
animals,  he  speaks  of  Nineveh  familiarly  as  a  great  city,  he  wishes  to 
be  of  the  middle  class,  and  even  ridicules  the  advantages  of  high  birth, 
so  that  he  can  in  no  wise  be  regarded  as  an  instance  of  the  common 
statement,  that  all  the  poets  of  the  lyric  age  were  aristocrats." 

3  21.  Tyrtceus.  See  Mahaffy,  i.  162-3:  When  the  famous  Leoni- 
das  was  asked  what  he  thought  of  Tyrtoeus,  he  answered  that  he  was 
.  .  .  good  for  stimulating  the  soul  of  youth,  and  the  extant  fragments 
confirm  this  judgment.  We  have  several  long  exhortations  to  valor 
(about  120  lines),  with  pictures  of  the  advantages  of  this  virtue  and  the 
disgrace  and  loss  attending  on  cowardice." 

Solon.  Cf.  Mahaffy,  i.  175:  "He  is  remarkable  in  having  written 
poetry,  not  as  a  profession,  nor  as  his  main  occupation,  but  as  a  relaxa- 
tion from  graver  cares.  He  was  first  a  merchant,  then  a  general,  then 
a  lawgiver,  and,  at  last,  a  philosophic  traveller;  and  all  these  conditions 
of  life,  except  the  first,  are  reflected  in  his  extant  fragments." 


NOTES. 


65 


Spurious  remains  of  some  of  the  above  poets  were  accepted  as  genu- 
ine in  Sidney's  time,  so  that  the  Elizabethans  had  more  confidence  in 
their  knowledge  of  them  than  the  critical  historians  of  this  century  are 
willing  to  profess. 

3  24.  Hidden  to.    Note  the  idiom. 

3  26.  Atlantic  Island.  With  respect  to  Solon's  authorship  of  the 
story  related  by  Plato  in  the  Critias,  Jowelt  says  (^Plato  3.  679)  :  "  We 
may  safely  conclude  that  the  entire  narrative  is  due  to  the  imagination 
of  Plato,  .  .  .  who  has  used  the  name  of  Solon  (of  whose  poem  there 
is  no  trace  in  antiquity)  ...  to  give  verisimilitude  to  his  story." 

3  27.  Plato.  Cf.  the  first  quotation  under  3  18,  11 19  note,  and  Mahaffy, 
Hist.  Grk.  Lit.  2.  207-8 :  "  In  his  style  he  is  as  modern  as  in  his  think- 
ing. He  employed  that  mixture  of  sober  prose  argument  and  of  poeti- 
cal metaphor  which  is  usual  in  the  ornate  prose  of  modern  Europe,  but 
foreign  to  the  character  and  stricter  art  of  the  Greeks.  This  style, 
which  is  freely  censured  by  Greek  critics  as  a  hybrid  or  bastard  prose, 
was  admirably  suited  to  a  lively  conversation,  where  a  sustained  and 
equable  tone  would  have  been  a  mistake.  .  .  .  Yet  his  appreciation 
of  the  great  poets,  though  his  criticisms  of  them  are  always  moral,  and 
never  aesthetic,  was  certainly  thorough,  and  told  upon  his  style.  Above 
all,  he  shows  a  stronger  Homeric  flavor  than  all  those  who  professed  to 
worship  the  epics  which  he  censured.  His  language  everywhere  bears 
the  influence  of  Homer,  just  as  some  of  our  greatest  and  purest  writers 
and  speakers  use  unconsciously  Biblical  phrases  and  metaphors."  See 
also  24  2G-7,  41  1. 

4  2.  Gyges''  Ring.  The  story  is  told  in  the  Republic^  359-360  (Jow- 
ett's  translation,  3.  229-230)  :  "  According  to  the  tradition,  Gyges  was 
a  shepherd  in  the  service  of  the  king  of  Lydia,  and,  while  he  was  in  the 
fielJ,  there  was  a  storm  and  earthquake  which  made  an  opening  in  the 
earth  at  the  place  where  he  was  feeding  his  flock.  Amazed  at  the  sight, 
he  descended  into  the  opening,  where,  among  other  marvels,  he  beheld 
a  hollow  brazen  horse,  having  doors,  at  which  he,  stooping  and  looking 
in,  saw  a  dead  body,  of  stature,  as  appeared  to  him,  more  than  human, 
and  having  nothing  on  but  a  gold  ring;  this  he  took  from  the  finger 
of  the  dead  and  reascended.  Now  the  shepherds  met  together,  accord- 
ing to  custom,  that  they  might  send  their  monthly  report  concerning 
the  flock  to  the  king;  and  into  their  assembly  he  came  having  the  ring 
on  his  finger;  and  as  he  was  sitting  among  them  he  chanced  to  turn 
the  collet  of  the  ring  towards  the  inner  side  of  his  hand,  when  instantly 
he  became  invisible,  and  the  others  began  to  speak  of  him  as  if  he  were 
no  longer  there.    He  was  astonished  at  this,  and  again  touching  the 


66 


NOTES. 


ring  he  turned  the  collet  outwards  and  reappeared  ;  thereupon  he 
made  trials  of  the  ring,  and  always  with  the  same  result:  when  he 
turned  the  collet  inwards  he  became  invisible,  when  outwards  he  reap- 
peared. Perceiving  this,  he  immediately  contrived  to  be  chosen  one  of 
the  messengers  sent  to  the  court,  where  he  no  sooner  arrived  than  he 
seduced  the  queen,  and  with  her  help  conspired  against  the  king  and 
slew  him,  and  took  the  kingdom." 

4  8.  Herodotus.  "The  history  of  Herodotus  is  half  a  poem;  it  was 
written  while  the  whole  field  of  literature  yet  belonged  to  the  Muses, 
and  the  nine  books  of  which  it  was  composed  were  therefore  of  right, 
as  well  as  of  courtesy,  superinscribed  with  their  nine  names."  T.  L. 
Peacock,  The  Four  Ages  of  Poetiy. 

4  10.  Stole  or  usurped  of  podry.  So  in  Sidney's  letter  to  his  brother 
Robert,  quoted  in  Fox  Bourne,  Memoir  of  Sidney y  p.  276 :  "  Besides 
this,  the  historian  makes  himself  a  discourser  for  profit,  and  an  orator, 
yea,  a  poet  sometimes,  for  ornament;  ...  a  poet  in  painting  forth  the 
effects,  the  motions,  the  whisperings  of  the  people,  which  though  in 
disputation  one  might  say  were  true,  yet  v/ho  will  mark  them  well 
shall  find  them  taste  of  a  poetical  vein." 

4  11.  Their  passionate  describing  of  passions.  Sidney  is  fond  of 
these  verbal  jingles,  produced  by  the  repetition  of  the  same  word  or 
root-syllable.  Cf.  8  27-28,34-35,  9  14-15,  10  4-5,  11  27,  13  10-13,  18  18, 
18  20-21,  19  1-2,  23  3,  28,  25  20-21,  23,  26  10-11,  28  1-2,  30  24,  3  1  8-9,  32  5, 
33  15-16,  35  7-8,  22-23,  37  21,  38  5,  45  27,  48  31,  5  1  5,  53  16,  53  30,  54  32-35, 
56  35,  58  8.  Specimens  of  rime  are  :  20  30.  44  20.  Of  assonance  : 
45  19-20,  54  8-9.  Of  alliteration  :  16  28,  32  17,  32-33,  34  32-33,  39  24, 41  11. 
Cf.  also  33  34.  Many  of  the  above  repetitions  fall  under  the  head 
of  allowable  rhetorical  figures,  and  some  of  them  would  scarcely  be 
remarked  on  a  first  reading;  but  there  can  be  no  question  that  Sidney's 
prose  would  be  improved  by  a  retrenchment  of  the  more  conspicuous 
examples. 

4  23.  Ireland.  Cf.  58  11-12,  and  see  Spenser,  State  of  Ireland  (Hales' 
edition,  p.  626)  :  "  For  where  you  say  that  the  Irish  have  always  been 
without  letters,  you  are  therein  much  deceived,  for  it  is  certain  that 
Ireland  hath  had  the  use  of  letters  very  anciently,  and  long  before 
England.  .  .  .  For  the  Saxons  of  England  are  said  to  have  their  letters 
and  learning  and  learned  men  from  the  Irish,  and  that  also  appeareth 
by  the  likeness  of  the  characters,  for  the  Saxons'  character  is  the  same 
■with  the  Irish.  ...  It  is  to  be  gathered  that  that  nation  which  came 
out  of  Spain  into  Ireland  were  anciently  Gauls,  and  that  they  brought 
with  them  those  letters  which  they  had  learned  in  Spain,  first  into 
Ireland." 


NOTES, 


67 


4  27.  Areytos,  Prof.  Daniel  G.  Brinton,  of  the  University  of  Penn- 
sylvania, kindly  gives  me  the  following  information:  "This  was  the 
name  applied  by  the  Spaniards  to  the  combination  of  song  and  dancing 
which  was  the  usual  ritual  of  the  native  tribes.  They  picked  up  the 
word  on  the  Great  Antilles,  and  it  is  derived  from  the  Arawack  aririn^ 
*  to  rehearse,  repeat.'  See  Oviedo,  Hist.  Gen.  de  las  IndiaSy  Lib.  V. 
cap.  I  (Madrid  edition)." 

A  fuller  account,  probably  from  Oviedo,  but  not  a  mere  transcript, 
is  given  by  Purchas,  Pilgi-ims^  Lib.  V.  ch.  3  (edition  of  1625;  3.  994)  : 
"  When  their  Caciques  are  dead  they  lay  them  on  a  piece  of  wood  or 
stone,  and  make  a  fire  about  the  same  which  may  not  burne  them,  but 
by  degrees  draw  forth  all  the  moysture  in  sweat,  leaving  only  the  skin 
and  bones,  and  then  in  a  place  separate  repose  the  same  with  the 
Ancestors  which  before  had  beene  so  dealt  with;  this  being  their  best 
Booke  of  Heraldrie  to  recount  the  Names  and  severall  Descents  in  that 
Pedegree.  If  any  die  in  battell,  or  so  that  they  cannot  recover  his 
body,  they  compose  Songs  which  the  Children  learne  touching  him, 
and  the  manner  of  his  death,  to  supply  that  memoriall.  These  Songs 
they  call  Areytos.  As  for  Letters  they  were  so  ignorant,  that  seeing 
the  intercourse  of  Spaniards  by  Letters,  they  thought  that  Letters  could 
speake,  and  were  very  cautelous  in  their  carriage  of  them,  lest  the 
Letters  might  accuse  them  of  ill  demeanor  by  the  way.  When  they 
will  disport  themselves,  the  Men  and  W^omen  meet  and  take  each 
other  by  the  hand,  and  one  goeth  before  which  is  called  Tequina  or 
their  Master,  with  certaine  paces  measured  to  his  singing  in  a  low 
voice  what  commeth  in  his  minde,  and  after  him  all  the  multitude 
answereth  in  a  higher  voice  with  like  measures  proportioned  to  the 
tune,  and  so  continue  they  three  or  foure  houres,  with  Chicha  or  Mayz- 
wine  among;  sometimes  also  changing  the  Tequina  and  taking  another 
with  a  new  tune  and  song." 

The  passage  from  Oviedo  is  as  follows :  "  In  this  island,  as  far  as  I 
have  been  able  to  learn,  their  songs,  which  they  call  ai-eytos,  constitute 
the  only  book  or  memorial  which  in  these  various  tribes  remains  from 
father  to  son,  and  from  the  present  to  future  times,  as  shall  here  be 
related"  (p.  125).  "These  people  have  a  good  and  courteous  man- 
ner of  communicating  things  past  and  ancient;  this  they  do  by  means 
of  their  songs  and  dances,  which  they  call  areyto^  and  which  is  the 
same  that  is  known  among  us  as  carol  (ring-dance  or  chain-dance). 
.  .  .  This  areyto  they  perform  in  the  following  manner :  When  they 
desire  recreation,  as  at  the  celebration  of  some  notable  festival,  or  merely 
for  pastime  on  other  occasions,  they  hold  an  assembly  of  many  Indians 


68 


NOTES. 


of  both  sexes  (now  and  then  of  men  only,  and  again  of  women  by 
themselves);  and  so  likewise  at  the  public  festivals,  as  for  a  victory 
over  their  enemies,  or  at  the  marriage  of  their  cacique  or  provincial 
king,  or  other  case  in  which  there  is  universal  rejoicing,  so  that  men 
and  women  mingle  freely  together.  In  order  to  the  increase  of  their 
joy  and  hilarity,  they  take  one  another  by  the  hand,  or  link  themselves 
arm  in  arm,  or  seat  themselves  in  a  line  or  ring.  The  office  of  leader 
is  then  assumed  by  some  one,  either  man  or  woman,  who  proceeds  to 
take  certain  steps  backwards  and  forwards,  after  the  manner  of  a  well- 
ordered  contrapas.  Immediately  they  all  repeat  it  after  him,  and  thus 
they  go  about,  singing  in  that  key,  whether  low  or  high,  that  the  leader 
sounds  for  them,  and  imitating  him  in  all  that  he  does  and  says,  the 
number  of  the  steps  keeping  measure  and  harmony  with  the  verses  or 
words  that  they  sing.  And  according  to  his  direction,  they  all  respond 
with  the  same  steps,  and  words,  and  order;  and  while  they  are  respond- 
ing the  guide  keeps  silence,  but  never  ceases  to  indicate  the  dancing 
step.  The  response  having  been  finished,  that  is,  the  repetition  of 
what  the  leader  has  prescribed,  he  at  once  proceeds  to  another  verse 
and  other  words,  which  the  whole  company  repeat  in  turn;  and  so 
they  continue  without  ceasing  for  three  or  four  hours  or  more,  until 
the  master  or  leader  of  the  dance  finishes  his  story,  and  sometimes  they 
even  adjourn  from  one  day  to  the  next.  .  .  .  And  thus  with  this  rude 
instrument  (i.e.  a  kind  of  drum),  or  without  it,  they  rehearse  in  song 
their  memoirs  and  past  histories,  and  tell  of  the  caciques  who  are  no 
more,  how  they  died,  who  and  how  great  they  were,  and  other  things 
which  they  do  not  wish  to  have  forgotten"  (pp.  127-28).  Cf.  also 
Puttenham,  Bk.  I.  ch.  5. 
5 10.  Even.  Merely. 

5  13.  Prophet.  Cf.  Shelley,  Defense  of  Poetry :  "  Poets,  according 
to  the  circumstances  of  the  age  and  nation  in  which  they  appeared, 
were  called,  in  the  earlier  epochs  of  the  world,  legislators  or  prophets. 
A  poet  essentially  comprises  and  unites  both  these  characters.  For  he 
not  only  beholds  intensely  the  present  as  it  is,  and  discovers  those  laws 
according  to  which  present  things  ought  to  be  ordered,  but  he  beholds 
the  future  in  the  present,  and  his  thoughts  are  the  germs  of  the  flower 
and  the  fruit  of  latest  time." 

5  20.  Sortes  Virgiliance.  Cf.  the  General  Introduction  to  Lonsdale 
and  Lee's  translation  of  Virgil,  p.  4:  "As  the  Sibylline  books  were 
consulted  for  the  indications  of  the  divine  will,  so  the  poems  of  Virgil, 
even  in  early  times,  were  opened  at  random  to  obtain  directions  from 
them.    It  is  said  that  the  emperor  Alexander  Severus  was  encouraged 


NOTES, 


69 


by  lighting  upon  the  passage  in  the  sixth  book  of  the  ^neid  which 
bids  the  Roman  *  rule  mankind  and  make  the  world  obey.'  .  .  .  Per- 
haps the  most  famous  instance  is  that  of  the  passage  in  the  fourth  book 
of  the  ^neid,  which  it  is  said  King  Charles  I.  opened,  and  which  runs 
as  follows : 

And  when  at  length  the  cruel  war  shall  cease, 
On  hard  conditions  may  he  buy  the  peace ; 
Nor  let  him  then  enjoy  supreme  command, 
But  fall  untimely  by  some  hostile  hand." 

5  22.  Histories  of  the  Emperors'  Lives,  The  so-called  Augustan 
Histories,  The  six  authors  represented  are  ^lius  Spartianus,  Vulcacius 
Gallicanus,  Trebellius  PoUio,  Julius  Capitolinus,  Flavins  Vopiscus,  and 
^lius  Lampridius.  The  collection  includes  the  lives  of  the  Roman 
emperors  from  117  to  284  A.D.,  but  the  authorship  of  the  various 
biographies  cannot  always  be  made  out  with  certainty.  Simcox,  Hist. 
Lat.  Lit.,  says  (2.  314-15)  :  "  In  general  the  majority  of  the  writers 
of  Augustan  history  huddle  notes  from  different  sources  together  with- 
out criticism.  The  only  point  they  endeavor  to  form  a  real  judgment 
on  is  the  moral  and  political  worth  of  the  different  emperors,  and  here 
they  are  not  without  insight."  The  life  of  Albinus  is  probably  by 
Spartianus  (Teuffel,  Gesch.  r'dm.  Lit.  §  392). 

5  23.  Albitttcs.  For  Albinus  in  general,  see  Gibbon,  ch.  5.  The 
anecdote  referred  to  by  Sidney  is  related  in  the  Augustan  History , 
ch.  5  of  the  Life  of  Albinus  :  "  He  passed  the  whole  of  his  boyhood 
in  Africa,  where  he  obtained  such  a  tincture  of  Greek  and  Latin  litera- 
ture as  might  be  expected  of  a  mind  which  had  already  begun  to  mani- 
fest a  martial  and  haughty  temper.  As  a  proof  of  this  disposition  it 
is  related  that  he  used  frequently  to  sing  among  his  playmates, 

Arma  amens  capio,  nec  sat  rationis  in  armis, 

afterward  repeating  *  Arma  amens  capio  '  as  a  kind  of  refrain."  The 
line  is  from  the  ^neid,  2.  314:  "To  arms  I  rush  in  frenzy  —  not  that 
good  cause  is  shown  for  arms."  Albinus,  who  was  governor  of  Britain, 
led  an  army  over  to  Lyons  against  his  rival,  Septimius  Severus,  and 
was  there  slain.  "  The  head  of  Albinus,"  says  Gibbon,  "  accompanied 
with  a  menacing  letter,  announced  to  the  Romans  that  he  (i.e.  Severus) 
was  resolved  to  spare  none  of  the  adherents  of  his  unfortunate  com- 
petitors." 

5  29.   Carmina,    The  true  etymology. 
5  31.  Altogether  not.    Not  altogether. 

5  32.  Delphos.     Instead  of  Delphi.    Occasionally  found  in  Latin 


70 


NOTES. 


writers,  and  common  among  the  Elizabethans.  Florio  uses  it  in  his 
translation  of  Montaigne,  Shakespeare  in  the  Winter^s  Tale^  and 
Greene  in  his  Paitdosto^  or  History  of  Dorastus  and  Fawnia  (1588), 
on  which  the  Winter^ s  Tale  is  founded. 

Sibylla'' s  prophecies.  See  Fisher,  Hist,  Christian  Church,  pp.  73-4: 
"  The  *  Sibylline  Oracles 'is  a  collection  of  prophecies,  partly  Jewish, 
and  antedating  the  birth  of  Jesus,  and  partly  Christian.  They  relate 
to  the  Messiah  and  his  work,  and  were  invented  with  a  pious  intent  to 
disseminate  what  their  authors  considered  important  religious  truths. 
They  are  frequently  quoted  by  early  ecclesiastical  writers."  The  best 
edition  is  that  by  Alexandre,  Paris,  1869. 

5  34.  Number  and  measure.    Cf.  11  30-31,  23  23,  33  22-24,  34  21. 
High-Jlying.    Cf.  highest- flying,  46  24. 

6  1.  Conceit.  Invention,  imagination.  So  12  2.  Sometimes  =  con- 
ception, idea :  3  1  28,  29,  36  29,  54  8,  5  5  23;  cf.  fore-conceit,  8  15.  Some- 
times =  apprehension,  understanding :  16  11,  19  34,  23  10, 14,  30  13  (?). 

6  2.    In  it.    Sidney  does  not  often  end  a  sentence  with  small  and 
insignificant  words.    Other  examples  are  6  28,  11  25,  12  7,  etc. 
6  6.   Great  learned  77ien.    Cf.  9  22-24. 

69.  Metre.  Cf.  Harington  (Haslewood,  2.  132)  :  "Some  part  of  the 
Scripture  was  written  in  verse,  as  the  Psalms  of  David,  and  certain 
other  songs  of  Deborah,  of  Solomon,  and  others,  which  the  learnedest 
divines  do  affirm  to  be  verse,  and  find  that  they  are  in  metre,  though 
the  rule  of  the  Hebrew  verse  they  agree  not  on."  See  also  Puttenham, 
Bk.  I.  ch.  4:  "King  David  also,  and  Solomon  his  son,  and  many  other 
of  the  holy  prophets,  wrate  in  metres,  and  used  to  sing  them  to  the 
harp,  although  to  many  of  us,  ignorant  of  the  Hebrew  language  and 
phrase,  and  not  observing  it,  the  same  seem  but  a  prose." 

612-13.  Awaking  his  musical  instruments.  Ps.  57.  8,  108.  2: 
"  Awake,  psaltery  and  harp." 

6  15.  Majesty.  Cf.  Ps.  45.  4,  "  And  in  thy  majesty  ride  on  prosperously 
because  of  truth  and  meekness  and  righteousness."  Also,  and  especially, 
Ps.  18.  7-15;  97.  2-5;  104.  3;  144.  5-6. 

6  16.  Beasts''  joyfulness  and  hills'  leaping.  Ps.  114.  4,  "The  moun- 
tains skipped  like  rams  and  the  little  hills  like  young  sheep." 

6 17.  Almost.  Pleonastic,  or  nearly  so.  See  under  almost^  in  the 
Phil.  Society's  Dictionary.    Cf.  47  4. 

619.  Beauty.  From  Plato,  Symposium  211  (Jowett's  tr.  2.  62): 
"  But  what  if  man  had  eyes  to  see  the  true  beauty  —  the  divine  beauty, 
I  mean,  pure  and  clear  and  unalloyed,  not  clogged  with  the  pollutions 
of  mortality,  and  all  the  colors  and  vanities  of  human  life  —  thither 


NOTES. 


71 


looking,  and  holding  converse  with  the  true  beauty  divine  and 
simple?  " 

6  19-20.  07tly  cleared  by  faith.  Perhaps  with  allusion  to  such  pas- 
sages as  2  Cor.  3.  18,  "But  we  all,  with  unveiled  face  reflecting  as  a 
mirror  the  glory  of  the  Lord,  are  transformed  into  the  same  image 
from  glory  to  glory."  Or  Heb.  11.  i,  "Now  faith  is  the  assurance  of 
things  hoped  for,  the  proving  of  things  not  seen."  Or  Heb.  12.  27, 
"  He  endured,  as  seeing  him  who  is  invisible."  Or  Isa.  33.  17,  "Thine 
eyes  shall  see  the  king  in  his  beauty." 

6  22-23.  Ridiculous  an  estimatio7t.    Cf.  2  12,  44  16-18,  45  4-6. 

624.  Deeper.    Note  the  form  of  the  adverb,  and  cf.  15  4. 

625.  Deserveth.  Plural  subject  with  force  of  singular.  Cf.  11  19-20. 
6  28.  UoLT]T'f]p.    Poieten.    Cf.  the  Variants. 

6  30.  rioter^.    Cf.  the  Variants. 

6  33.  Alaker.  This  word  was  especially  used  in  Scotland  to  desig- 
€iate  a  poet. 

7  4.  Actors  a7id  players.  Cf.  Emerson,  Uses  of  Great  Men  :  "  As 
plants  convert  the  minerals  into  food  for  animals,  so  each  man  converts 
some  raw  material  in  nature  to  human  use.  .  .  .  Each  man  is,  by  secret 
liking,  connected  with  some  district  of  nature,  whose  agent  and  inter- 
preter he  is." 

7  5.  Astronomer.    Cf.  12  9-12,  35  25. 

7  7.   Geometrician.    Cf.  12  16,  28  5,  35  25. 

7  8.  Arithmetician.    Cf.  28  6. 

7  10.  Natural  philosopher.    Cf.  12  14. 

7  11.  Moral  philosopher.    Cf.  13  7. 

7  12.  Virtues f  vices,  and  passions.  Cf.  1123,  16  17,  but  especially 
17  9-10.  See  also  Sidney's  letter  to  his  brother  Robert,  quoted  in  Fox 
Bourne,  Memoir,  p.  277:  "A  moral  philosopher,  either  in  the  epic 
part  when  he  sets  forth  virtues  or  vices,  and  the  natures  of  passions,  or 
in  the  politic,  when  he  doth  (as  he  often  doth)  meddle  sententiously 
with  matters  of  estate." 

Follow  nature.  Cf.,  for  example,  Marcus  Aurelius,  Thoughts  7.  55  : 
"  Do  not  look  around  thee  to  discover  other  men's  ruling  principles, 
but  look  straight  to  this,  to  what  nature  leads  thee,  both  the  universal 
nature  through  the  things  which  happen  to  thee,  and  thy  own  nature 
through  the  things  which  must  be  done  by  thee." 

7  18-19.  Compassed  within  the  circle  of  a  question.  Cf.  Sidney's  letter 
to  his  brother  Robert,  quoted  in  Fox  Bourne,  Memoir,  p.  276 :  "  We 
leave  all  these  discourses  to  the  confused  trust  of  our  memory,  because 
they,  being  not  tied  to  the  tenor  of  a  question  .  .  ." 


72 


NOTES. 


7  20.  Physician,    Cf.  3  5  28. 

7  22.  Metaphysic.  Metaphysician  ( ?).  Cf.  12 14,  and  Bacon's  use 
of  politic  for  politician^  Adv.  Learning  I.  I.  i,  i.  2.  i,  etc. 

7  22-24.  Though  .  .  .  yet.  Cf.  9  8-9,  15  1-2,  38  8-11,  39  2-3,  50  24-25. 
7  30.   77/^.    Superfluous  according  to  present  usage.    Cf.  28  2. 

7  35.  So  rich.  Cf.  5  15,  6  22,  8  8-10,  32  22,  44  31-33,  52  13,  but  such 
famous^  44  29-30. 

8  2.  Too-7nuch-loved.  Cf.  55  25,  and  Warton,  Hist.  Eng.  Poetry 
4.  394 :  "  Compound  epithets,  which  Sir  Philip  Sidney  had  imported 
from  France,  and  first  used  in  his  Arcadia?'' 

85.  Go  to  man.  Cf.  Everett,  Poetry^  Comedy,  and  Duty,  p.  312: 
"  Poetry  produces  its  creations  to  supplement  the  world.  Art  rears 
temples,  which,  in  the  words  of  Emerson  already  quoted,  nature  adopts 
into  her  race.  Shakespeare  creates  a  world  of  characters  and  events 
which  takes  its  place  by  the  side  of  the  world  of  actual  persons  and 
events." 

8  6.  //  seemeth  in  him.  For  the  omission  of  that  before  a  subject 
clause  cf.  18  7. 

8  8.    Theagenes.    Cf.  11  16-18. 

8  9.  Py lades.  See  Euripides'  drama,  Iphigenia  among  the  Tauri 
(Morley's  Universal  Library,  No.  54). 

Orlando.  The  hero  of  Ariosto's  poem,  the  Orlando  Furioso  (Eng- 
lish translation  by  Rose,  in  Bohn's  Illustrated  Library). 

8 10.  Xenophon's  Cyrus.  The  hero  of  Xenophon's  Cyropcedia,  a 
historical  romance  (translation  in  Bohn's  Classical  Library). 

8  15.  Idea,  or  fore-co7tceit.    Cf.  10  14. 

8  19.  By.    Concerning.    Cf.  21  34,  22  1,  2. 

8  25.  Neither  let  it,  etc.  Cf.  Shelley,  Defense  of  Poetry :  "  It  (i.e. 
poetry)  creates  anew  the  universe,  after  it  has  been  annihilated  in  our 
minds  by  the  recurrence  of  impressions  blunted  by  reiteration.  It 
justifies  the  bold  and  trvfc  word  of  Tasso, '  Non  merita  nome  di  creatore, 
se  non  Iddio  ed  il  Poeta '  (None  merits  the  name  of  creator  except 
God  and  the  poet)." 

829.  Over  all  the  works.  Alluding  to  Heb.  2.  7,  "And  didst  set 
him  over  the  works  of  thy  hands."  Cf.  Coleridge,  Biog.  Lit.  ch.  13: 
"The  primary  imagination  I  hold  to  be  the  Hving  power  and  prime 
agent  of  all  human  perception,  and  as  a  repetition  in  the  finite  mind 
of  the  eternal  act  of  creation  in  the  infinite  I  AM." 

8  31.  Force  of  a  divine  breath.    Cf.  43  14,  57  25. 

9  4.  Name  above  all  naj?ies.    Philippians  2.  9. 

9  12.  Art  of  i77iitation.    Cf.  24  10,  42  16,  42  20,  and  Aristotle,  Poetics, 


NOTES. 


73 


I.  2:  "Not  only  the  epic  and  tragedy,  but  comedy,  dithyrambic  poetry, 
and  all  such  as  is  to  be  accompanied  by  the  flute  and  the  lyre  —  all 
these  are  (/jLifx-qa-eis)  representations  by  means  of  imitation." 
9  15.  Speaking  picture.    Cf.  16  22;  also  15  35. 

9  16.  Teach  and  delight.  So  10  21,  10  29.  Cf.  11  24,  20  8-9,  50  21,  52  3, 
and  Don  Quixote,  Bk.  I.  ch.  47  :  "  The  better  end  of  all  writing,  which 
is  to  instruct  and  delight  together." 

9 17.  Three  general  kinds.  This  division  is  taken  from  Scaliger, 
Poetics,  5.  d.  I,  which  I  thus  translate:  "The  kinds  of  poets  may  be 
reduced  to  three  principal  orders.  The  first  is  that  of  religious  poets, 
such  as  Orpheus  and  Amphion,  whose  art  was  so  divine  that  they  are 
believed  to  have  imparted  a  soul  to  inanimate  things.  The  second  is 
that  of  the  philosophical  poets,  who  are  again  of  two  sorts  —  natural, 
such  as  Empedocles,  Nicander,  Aratus,  Lucretius,  and  moral,  which  is 
again  divided  into  several  species,  such  as  political,  represented  by 
Solon  and  Tyrtseus,  economical  by  Hesiod,  and  general  by  Phocylides, 
Theognis,  and  Pythagoras.  The  third  are  those  of  whom  we  shall 
presently  speak." 

9  22.  Hymns.  By  the  hymns  of  Moses  Sidney  probably  means  the 
Song  of  Deliverance  after  the  passage  of  the  Red  Sea,  Exod.  15.  1-19; 
his  Song  of  God's  Guidance,  uttered  just  before  his  death,  Deut.  32.  1-43; 
and  perhaps  the  Ninetieth  Psalm,  usually  ascribed  to  Moses.  By  that  of 
Deborah  he  means  the  fifth  chapter  of  Judges. 

9  23.  Emanuel  Tretnellius,  A  Biblical  scholar  (1510-1580  A.D.). 
Born  a  Jew,  he  was  converted  to  Protestantism,  and  came  to  England, 
where  he  was  settled  for  a  time  at  Oxford.  At  the  accession  of  Mary 
Tudor,  in  1553,  he  left  England. 

Eranciscus  Junius.  Francis  Junius,  or  Du  Jon,  or  Dujon,  the  Elder 
(i 545-1 602),  not  to  be  confounded  with  his  famous  son  Francis,  the 
Germanist  and  Old  English  scholar  (i 589-1 677).  He  was  associated 
with  Tremellius  in  editing  the  Bible.  The  Third  Part,  which  Sidney 
quotes,  was  issued  in  1579. 

9  24.  Poetical  part  of  the  Scripture.  In  Part  III.  of  their  edition 
of  the  Bible,  these  scholars  include  among  the  poetical  books  Job, 
Psalms,  Proverbs,  Ecclesiastes,  and  Song  of  Solomon. 

9  27.  Orpheus,  Amphion.  Cf.  note  on  9  17  above,  and  the  index  of 
proper  names. 

IIy?nns.  See  Mahaffy,  Hist.  Grk.  Lit,  i.  129:  "There  are  trans- 
mitted to  us,  under  the  title  of  Hoineric  Hymns,  a  collection  of  five 
longer  and  twenty-nine  shorter  poems  in  epic  dialect  and  metre,  each 
inscribed  to  some  particular  god,  and  narrating  some  legend  connected 


74 


NOTES, 


with  him,  but  in  no  sense  religious  hymns,  as  were  those  of  Pamphus 
or  the  hymns  of  the  choral  lyric  poets.  The  Homeric  Hymns  are 
essentially  secular  and  not  religious;  they  seem  distinctly  intended  to 
be  recited  in  competitions  of  rhapsodes,  and  in  some  cases  even  for 
direct  pay."  An  English  translation  was  made  by  George  Chapman, 
and  may  be  found  in  his  works,  of  which  a  convenient  edition  was 
published  in  London  in  1875. 

9  29.  St.  yaines\  James  5.  13.  In  the  Ponsonby  edition  of  the 
Defense  this  counsel  is  attributed  to  St.  Paul.  The  Olney  edition  has 
it  correctly.  The  words  are  the  well-known  ones  of  the  King  James 
version,  "  Is  any  merry?  let  him  sing  psalms." 

9  30-31.  And  I  know  is  used.  Sidney  himself  translated  the  first 
forty-three  Psalms,  leaving  his  sister, 

Sidney's  sister,  Pembroke's  mother, 

as  Ben  Jonson  called  her,  to  complete  the  Psalter.  A  selection  from 
the  work  of  both  is  contained  in  Ruskin's  Rock  Honeycomb^  Sidney's 
work  in  Grosart's  Cotnplete  Poems  of  Sir  Philip  Sidney  (Fuller  Worthies' 
Library,  1873),  Vol.  IL,  and  the  whole  Psalter  in  the  Chiswick  Press 
edition  of  1823.  I  subjoin  the  twenty-third  Psalm  in  Sidney's  version, 
and  two  specimens  of  his  sister's  rendering  (Psalms  119  B  and  150)  : 

Psalm  23. 

The  Lord,  the  Lord  my  shepherd  is, 

And  so  can  never  I 

Taste  misery. 
He  rests  me  in  green  pastures  His ; 

By  waters  still  and  sweet 

He  guides  my  feet. 

He  me  revives  ;  leads  me  the  way 

Which  righteousness  doth  take, 

For  His  name's  sake ; 
Yea,  though  I  should  through  valleys  stray 

Of  death's  dark  shade,  I  will 

No  whit  fear  ill. 

For  Thou,  dear  Lord,  Thou  me  besett'st ; 

Thy  rod  and  Thy  staff  be 

To  comfort  me ; 
Before  me  Thou  a  table  sett'st 

Even  when  foes'  envious  eye 

Doth  it  espy. 


NOTES. 


Thou  oil'st  my  head,  Thou  fill'st  my  cup, 

Nay  more,  Thou,  Endless  Good, 

Shalt  give  me  food  ; 
To  Thee,  I  say,  ascended  up. 

Where  Thou,  the  Lord  of  all, 

Dost  hold  Thy  hall. 

Psalm  119  B  (9-16). 

By  what  correcting  line 
May  a  young  man  make  straight  his  crooked  way  ? 
By  level  of  Thy  lore  divine. 
Sith  then  with  so  good  cause 
My  heart  Thee  seeks,  O  Lord,  I  seeking  pray : 
Let  me  not  wander  from  Thy  laws. 

Thy  speeches  have  I  hid 
Close  locked  up  in  casket  of  my  heart, 
Fearing  to  do  what  they  forbid. 
But  this  can  not  suffice ; 
Thou  wisest  Lord,  who  ever-blessed  art, 
Yet  make  me  in  Thy  statutes  wise. 

Then  shall  my  lips  declare 
The  sacred  laws  that  from  Thy  mouth  proceed, 
And  teach  all  nations  what  they  are ; 
For  what  Thou  dost  decree 
To  my  conceit  far  more  delight  doth  breed 
Than  worlds  of  wealth,  if  worlds  might  be. 

Thy  precepts,  therefore,  I 
Will  my  continual  meditation  make, 

And  to  Thy  paths  will  have  good  eye ; 
The  orders  by  Thee  set 
Shall  cause  me  in  them  greatest  pleasure  take, 
"T  Nor  once  will  I  Thy  words  forget. 

Psalm  150. 

O  laud  the  Lord,  the  God  of  Hosts  commend. 
Exalt  His  power,  advance  His  holiness. 
With  all  your  might  lift  His  almightiness ; 

Your  greatest  praise  upon  His  greatness  spend. 

Make  trumpet's  noise  in  shrillest  notes  ascend. 
Make  lute  and  lyre  His  loved  fame  express, 
Him  let  the  pipe,  Him  let  the  tabret  bless. 

Him  organ's  breath,  that  winds  or  waters  lend. 


76 


NOTES, 


Let  ringing  timbrels  so  His  honor  sound, 
Let  sounding  cymbals  so  His  glory  ring, 

That  in  their  tunes  such  melody  be  found 
As  fits  the  pomp  of  most  triumphant  king; 

Conclude  by  all  that  air  or  life  enfold, 

Let  high  Jehovah  highly  be  extolled. 

10 1.  Cato.  The  aphorisms  bearing  his  name  are  now  thought  to 
belong  to  the  third  century  a.d.  Cf.  Simcox,  Hist.  Lat.  Lit,  2.  302 : 
"  Another  work  of  the  same  period,  which  had  an  enormous  success  in 
the  Middle  Ages,  was  the  four  books  of  moral  aphorisms  of  Dionysius 
Cato,  who  has  been,  apparently,  extensively  edited  by  Christian  copyists, 
who  have  left  out  and  inserted  as  suited  them.  Still  the  old  foundation 
is  visible." 

Lucretius.  About  98-55  B.C.  The  work  to  which  reference  is  made 
is  entitled  On  the  Nature  of  Things. 

10  2.  Manilius.  A  Roman  poet  who  lived  in  the  reigns  of  Augustus 
and  Tiberius,  concerning  whom  little  else  is  known.  Even  his  name 
is  uncertain.  He  is  an  imitator  of  Lucretius,  whose  theories  he  opposes. 
Cf.  Cruttwell,  Hist.  Rom.  Lit.  p.  315  :  "The  subject  is  called  Astronomy ^ 
but  should  rather  be  called  Astrology,  for  more  than  half  the  space  is 
taken  up  with  those  baseless  theories  of  sidereal  influence  which  belong 
to  the  imaginary  side  of  the  science.  But  in  the  exordia  and  perora- 
tions of  the  book,  as  well  as  in  sundry  digressions,  may  be  found 
matter  of  greater  value,  embodying  the  poet's  views  on  the  great 
questions  of  philosophy." 

Pontanus.  An  Italian  scholar  of  the  Renaissance  (1426- 1503). 
His  poems  were  published  at  Venice  in  two  volumes,  1505-8.  He  is 
said,  on  good  authority,  to  have  coined  the  word  alliteration,  in  the 
sense  now  assigned  to  it.  Cf.  Symonds,  Renaissance  in  Ltaly  2.  466 : 
"  It  was  not,  however,  by  his  lighter  verses  so  much  as  by  the  five 
books  called  De  Stellis,  or  Urania,  that  Pontanus  won  the  admiration 
of  Italian  scholars.  In  this  long  series  of  hexameters  he  contrived  to 
set  forth  the  whole  astronomical  science  of  his  age,  touching  upon  the 
mythology  of  the  celestial  signs,  describing,  the  zodiac,  discussing  the 
motion  of  the  heavens,  raising  the  question  of  planetary  influences, 
and  characterizing  the  different  regions  of  the  globe  by  their  relation 
to  the  sun's  path  across  the  sky." 

10  3.  Lucan.  The  author  (39-65  A.D.)  of  the  unfinished  epic  Phar- 
salia.  Quintilian  says  of  him  (10.  I.  90)  :  "Lucan  is  ardent,  earnest, 
and  full  of  admirably  expressed  sentiments,  and,  to  give  my  real  opinion, 
should  be  classed  with  orators  rather  than  poets."    Cf.  also  Servius,  in 


NOTES. 


77 


his  commentary  on  the  ^neid,  i.  382:  "  Lucan  does  not  deserve  to 
be  included  among  the  poets,  because  he  appears  rather  to  have  com- 
posed a  history  than  a  poem."  Cruttwell,  HisL  Rom.  Lit.  p.  371  :  "A 
strong  depreciation  of  Lucan's  genius  has  been  for  some  time  the  rule 
of  criticism.  .  .  .  Yet  throughout  the  Middle  Ages,  and  during  more 
than  one  great  epoch  in  French  history,  he  was  ranked  among  the 
highest  epic  poets."  One  of  his  greatest  admirers  was  Dante  {^Inf. 
4.  90),  and  one  of  his  severest  critics  is  Nisard,  PoUes  latins  de  la 
decadence. 

10  7.  Fold  of  the  proposed  subject.    Cf.  7  19. 

10  8.  Whether  they,  etc.  Cf.  Ruskin's  Rock  Honeycomb,  Preface,  p. 
4,  note :  "  Satirical  primarily,  or  philosophical,  verses,  as  of  Juvenal, 
Lucretius,  or  Pope's  Essay  on  Criticism,  are  merely  measured  prose,  — 
the  grander  for  being  measured,  but  not,  because  of  their  bonds, 
becoming  poetry." 

10  14.  Who  having  no  law  but  wit.  Such  was  Cicero's  notion  of  art. 
Orator,  2.  9  :  "  Nor  did  that  artist  (i.e.  Phidias),  in  forming  the  statue  of 
Jupiter  or  Minerva,  have  in  mind  some  individual  whom  he  imitated; 
rather  was  his  soul  haunted  by  a  certain  glorious  beauty,  upon  which 
he  gazed  intently,  and  by  this  means  directed  his  art  and  his  hand  to 
achieve  the  perfect  resemblance."  Cicero  was  probably  dependent  for 
his  opinion  upon  Plato,  as,  for  example,  in  Timccus  28  (Jowett  3.  612)  : 
"  The  work  of  the  artificer  who  looks  always  to  the  abiding  and  the 
unchangeable,  and  who  designs  and  fashions  his  work  after  an  un- 
changeable pattern,  must  of  necessity  be  made  fair  and  perfect;  but 
that  of  an  artificer  who  looks  to  the  created  only,  and  fashions  his 
work  after  a  created  pattern,  is  not  fair  or  perfect." 

Cf.  also  Shakespeare's  words,  M.  N.  D.  5.  14-17 : 

And  as  imagination  bodies  forth 
The  forms  of  things  unknown,  the  poet's  pen 
Turns  them  to  shapes  and  gives  to  airy  nothing 
A  local  habitation  and  a  name. 

10  17.  Lucretia.    The  story  is  told  in  Livy  I.  58. 

10  24.  May  be  and  should  be.    Cf.  note  on  18  25. 

10  26.  Excellentest.  For  other  polysyllabic  superlatives,  cf.  15  11, 
46  23. 

10  30.  To  move  men,  etc.    Cf.  23  15  ff.,  24  28  ff. 

10  33.  Noblest  scope.    Cf.  13  1,  15  13. 

10  34.  Idle  tongues.    Cf.  32  14  ff. 

1 1  2-3.  Heroic  .  .  .  pastoral.    By  a  sort  of  rhetorical  device,  Sidney, 


78 


NOTES. 


when  he  again  introduces  these  species  of  poetry,  does  so  in  an  order 
the  reverse  of  this.  Cf.  26  31,  27  12,  27  19,  27  22,  27  31,  28  27,  29 14, 
30  12. 

11  7.  Apparelled.  Not  merely  *  dressed,' but  *  showily  dressed.'  Cf. 
29  24,  30  23,  but  especially  52  35.  Shakespeare  has  a  similar  use  of 
the  word,  as  in  Err.  3.  2.  12:  "Apparel  vice  like  virtue's  harbinger." 

11  8.  Numberous.    Note  the  form. 

11  9.  But  an  ornainent.  Cf.  33  11  ff.  See  also  Harington  (Hasle- 
wood,  2.  131)  :  "The  other  part  of  poetry,  wnich  is  verse,  as  it  were 
the  clothing  or  ornament  of  it." 

11 11.  Many  versifiers.    Cf.  46  6. 

11 13-16.  Xenophon  .  .  ,  heroical  poem.  Literally  excerpted  by 
Meres,  Palladis  Tamia  (Haslewood,  2.  150). 

11 15.  Cicero.  See  his  letter  to  his  brother  Quintus,  i.  i.  8.  23: 
"This  Cyrus  is  not  portrayed  by  Xenophon  with  historical  accuracy, 
but  in  the  likeness  of  just  rule." 

11 16.  Heliodorus.  Fox  Bourne  says  of  Sidney  {Memoir,  p.  324)  : 
"  In  his  youth  he  had  read  diligently  the  Ethiopic  History  of  HeHodorus, 
lately  translated  out  of  the  Greek  by  Thomas  Underdown."  Cf.  also 
Warton,  Hist.  Eng.  Poetry  4.  299,  and  see  Dunlop,  History  of  Fiction, 
ch.  I.  The  tale  is  found  in  Greek  Romances.,  Bohn's  Classical 
Library.  Meres  thus  imitates  Sidney  (Haslewood,  2.  150):  "And  as 
Heliodorus  writ  in  prose  his  sugared  invention  of  that  picture  of  love 
in  Theagenes  and  Chariclea,  ...  so  Sir  Philip  Sidney  writ  his  immortal 
poem  The  Countess  of  Pembroke's  Arcadia  in  prose,  and  yet  our  rarest 
poet." 

11  17.  Sugared.  A  word  much  used  by  the  Elizabethans,  in  the 
sense  of  *  charming,'  *  delightful.' 

11 19.  //  is  not  ritning  and  versing  that  maketh  a  poet.  Cf.  Shelley, 
Defense  of  Poetry  :  "  An  observation  of  the  regular  mode  of  the  recur- 
rence of  harmony  in  the  language  of  poetical  minds,  together  with  its 
relation  to  music,  produced  metre,  or  a  certain  system  of  traditional 
forms  of  harmony  and  language.  Yet  it  is  by  no  means  essential  that 
a  poet  should  accommodate  his  language  to  this  traditional  form,  so 
that  the  harmony,  which  is  its  spirit,  be  observed.  The  practice  is 
indeed  convenient  and  popular,  and  to  be  preferred  especially  in  such 
composition  as  includes  much  action;  but  every  great  poet  must  inev- 
itably innovate  upon  the  example  of  his  predecessors  in  the  exact 
structure  of  his  peculiar  versification.  The  distinction  between  poets 
and  prose  writers  is  a  vulgar  error.  .  .  .  Plato  was  essentially  a  poet  — 
the  truth  and  splendor  of  his  imagery,  and  the  melody  of  his  language, 


NOTES. 


79 


are  the  most  intense  that  it  is  possible  to  conceive.  .  .  .  Lord  Bacon 
was  a  poet.  His  language  has  a  sweet  and  majestic  rhythm,  which 
satisfies  the  sense  no  less  than  the  almost  superhuman  wisdom  of  his 
philosophy  satisfies  the  intellect.  .  .  .  All  the  authors  of  revolutions 
in  opinion  are  not  only  necessarily  poets  as  they  are  inventors,  nor  even 
as  their  words  unveil  the  permanent  analogy  of  things  by  images  which 
participate  in  the  life  of  truth;  but  as  their  periods  are  harmonious  and 
rhythmical,  and  contain  in  themselves  the  elements  of  verse;  being  the 
echo  of  the  eternal  music."  See  also  Abbott,  Introduction  to  Bacon's 
Essays,  pp.  23-4 :  "  But  Bacon  was  a  poet,  the  poet  of  Science.  His 
eye,  like  the  poet's  — 

in  a  fine  frenzy  rolling, 
Doth  glance  from  heaven  to  earth,  from  earth  to  heaven 

—  catching  at  similarities  and  analogies  invisible  to  uninspired  eyes, 
giving  them  names  and  shapes,  investing  them  with  substantial  reality, 
and  mapping  out  the  whole  realm  of  knowledge  in  ordered  beauty." 
Cervantes  says,  Don  Quixote,  Bk.  I.  ch.  47 :  "  An  epic  may  also  be  as 
well  written  in  prose  as  in  verse." 

11  23.  Notable  images.  Sidney,  like  Aristotle  in  his  Poetics,  is  fond 
of  using  the  language  of  the  sister  art  of  painting  when  discoursing  of 
poetry.    Cf.  9  15,  10  12  ff.,  15  33,  16  13,  22,  19  G,  14,  36  21,  34-5,  3  7  35  ff. 

1126.  Fittest  raiment,  ^X.z.    Cf.  33  16-24. 

11  27.  Matter  .  .  .  manner.    Cf.  46  34. 

11  29.   Chanceably.    Cf.  5  18. 

1130.  Peizing.    Poising,  weighing.    Used  by  Shakespeare. 

11  34.  Parts.    Cf.  26  12  ff.    Anatomies.  Dissections. 

12  15.  Music.    Cf.  23  25,  33  26,  and  see  20  10. 

1218.  Dungeon.  Cf.  Plato,  Phcedo  82-3  (Jowett  I.  460):  "The 
soul  is  able  to  view  real  existence  only  through  the  bars  of  a  prison, 
and  not  of  herself  unhindered;  she  is  wallowing  in  the  mire  of  all 
ignorance;  and  philosophy,  beholding  the  terrible  nature  of  her  con- 
finement, inasmuch  as  the  captive  through  lust  becomes  a  chief  accom- 
plice in  her  own  captivity  .  .  .  philosophy,  I  say,  shows  her  that  all 
this  is  visible  and  tangible,  but  that  what  she  sees  in  her  own  nature 
is  intellectual  and  invisible." 

12  21.  Ditch.  See  Plato,  Thecetetus  174  (Jowett  4.  324):  "I  will 
illustrate  my  meaning,  Theodorus,  by  the  jest  which  the  clever  witty 
Thracian  handmaid  made  about  Thales,  when  he  fell  into  a  well  as  he 
was  looking  up  at  the  stars.  She  said  that  he  was  so  eager  to  know 
what  was  going  on  in  heaven,  that  he  could  not  see  what  was  before 


80 


NOTES. 


his  feet.  This  is  a  jest  which  is  equally  applicable  to  all  philosophers." 
Cf.  Sonnet  19  of  Astrophel  and  Stella  : 

,  .  .  Unto  me,  who  fare  like  him  that  both 
Looks  to  the  skies,  and  in  a  ditch  doth  fall  ? 

12  25.  Serving  sciences.    Cf.  14  29. 

12  28.  Mistress-knowledge.  Florio,  in  his  translation  of  Montaigne, 
uses  w/j/r^jj  as  a  quasi-adjective:  "The  mistress  and  worthiest  part" 
(2.  13);  "this  sovran  and  mistress  amity"  (2.  19). 

*Apx'-TeKToi/iK'l).  For  the  English  form  of  the  adjective,  see  Fulke 
Greville,  Life  of  Sidney  (IVor/cs  4.  21):  "But  the  truth  is,  his  end 
was  not  writing,  even  while  he  wrote,  nor  his  knowledge  moulded  for 
tables  or  schools;  but  both  his  wit  and  understanding  bent  upon  his 
heart,  to  make  himself  and  others,  not  in  words  or  opinion  but  in  life 
and  action,  good  and  great.  In  which  architectonical  art  he  was  such 
a  master,  with  so  commanding  and  yet  equal  ways  amongst  men,  that 
wheresoever  he  went  he  was  beloved  and  obeyed." 

12  30.  £t/iic  and  politic.     Cf.  13  24-20,  16  18,  20  3. 

12  31.    Well-doing    Cf.  15  13,  22  26. 

12  32.  Saddler's,  etc.  Cf.  Aristotle,  Ethics  I.  I  :  "All  moral  action, 
that  is  to  say  all  purpose,  no  less  than  all  art  and  all  science,  would 
seem  to  aim  at  some  good  result.  Hence  has  come  a  not  inapt 
definition  of  the  chief  good  as  that  one  end  at  which  all  human  actions 
aim.  Now  ends  clearly  differ  from  one  another.  P'or,  firstly,  in  some 
cases  the  end  is  an  act,  while  in  others  it  is  a  material  result  beyond 
and  beside  that  act.  And,  where  the  action  involves  any  such  end 
beyond  itself,  this  end  is  of  necessity  better  than  is  the  act  by  which 
it  was  produced.  And,  secondly,  since  there  are  many  kinds  of  moral 
action,  and  many  arts,  and  many  sciences,  their  ends  are  also  many; 
medicine,  for  example,  giving  us  health,  boat-building  a  boat,  tactics 
victory,  and  economics  wealth.  And,  where  many  such  arts  are  subordi- 
nated to  some  one,  —  as  to  riding  is  subordinated  bridle-making,  and 
all  other  arts  concerned  with  the  production  of  accoutrements  for 
horses,  while  riding  itself,  and  with  it  all  other  martial  service,  is  subor- 
dinated to  the  science  of  military  tactics,  and  in  many  other  arts  the 
same  scale  of  subordination  is  to  be  found,  —  in  all  such  cases  the  end 
of  the  supreme  art  or  science  is  higher  than  are  the  ends  of  the  arts 
subordinate  to  it;  for  it  is  only  for  the  sake  of  the  former  that  the 
latter  are  sought." 

13  1.  So  that,  etc.    Cf.  26  7-8. 

13  4.  Princes.    Cf.  26  9,  and  Don  Quixote,  Part  II.  ch.  16  (Duf- 


NOTES. 


81 


field's  translation)  :  "  Poetry,  noble  sir,  to  my  seeming,  is  like  unto  a 
gentle  maiden,  young  in  years,  and  of  extreme  beauty,  whom  to  enrich, 
beautify,  and  adorn,  is  the  care  of  the  many  maidens  who  attend  her 
—  which  be  the  other  sciences,  —  and  she  must  be  served  of  all,  while 
to  all  these  she  must  lend  her  lustre.  But  this  same  maiden  will  brook 
no  handling,  nor  be  haled  through  the  streets." 
13  9.  For  to.    Cf.  44  9,  49  27. 

13  11.  Set  their  names.  Drawn  from  Cicero,  Archias  1 1.  26  (cf. 
Tusc.  Disp.  I.  15.  34)  .'  ."Those  very  philosophers  even  in  the  books 
which  they  write  about  despising  glory,  put  their  own  names  on  the 
title-page.  In  the  very  act  of  recording  their  contempt  for  renown  and 
notoriety,  they  desire  to  have  their  own  names  known  and  talked  of." 

13  12.  Subtility.    Cf.  53  35.  Angry.    See  Trench's  Plutarch,  p.  132. 

13  14.  Definitions.    Cf.  16  17,  23  21. 

13  15.  Distinctions.    Cf.  16  34. 

13  29.  Authorizing  himselfi  Cf.  3  5  35,  36  5. 

14  2.  In  a  great  chafe.  The  phrase  is  found  again  in  Sidney's 
masque,  The  Lady  of  the  May. 

14  4.  Testis  temporum.  From  Cicero,  On  Oratory  2.  9.  36 :  "  His- 
tory, the  evidence  of  time,  the  light  of  truth,  the  life  of  memory,  the 
directress  of  life,  the  herald  of  antiquity." 

14  11.  Abstract.    Cf.  15  23. 

14  16.  Guide  .  .  .  light.  The  antithesis  will  here  be  more  striking 
if  we  substitute  the  Latin  words,  dux^  lux. 

14  20.  Brutus.  85-42  B.C.  The  Brutus  of  Shakespeare's  Julius 
Ccesar.  Cf.  Plutarch,  Brutus  4  :  "  During  the  time  that  he  was  in  camp, 
those  hours  that  he  did  not  spend  with  Pompey  he  employed  in  reading 
and  study;  and  thus  he  passed  the  day  before  the  battle  of  Pharsalia. 
It  was  the  middle  of  summer,  the  heats  were  intense,  the  marshy  situa- 
tion of  the  camp  disagreeable,  and  his  tent-bearers  were  long  in  coming. 
Nevertheless,  though  extremely  harassed  and  fatigued,  he  did  not  anoint 
himself  till  noon;  and  then,  taking  a  morsel  of  bread,  while  others 
were  at  rest,  or  musing  on  the  event  of  the  ensuing  day,  he  employed 
himself  till  the  evening  in  writing  an  epitome  of  Poiybius." 

Alphonsus,  1 385-1454.  Ticknor,  Hist.  Span.  Lit.  I.  317  (3d 
Amer.  ed.)  :  "  Alphonso  the  Fifth  of  Aragon,  a  prince  of  rare  wisdom 
and  much  literary  cultivation."  Cf.  Symonds,  Renaissance  in  Italy  2. 
252-3 :  "  In  the  second  age  of  humanism  .  .  .  Alfonso  of  Aragon  deserved 
the  praise  bestowed  on  him  by  Vespasiano  of  being,  next  to  Nicholas  V., 
the  most  munificent  promoter  of  learning.  His  love  of  letters  was 
genuine.  .  .  .  Vespasiano  relates  that  Beccadelli's  daily  readings  to  his 


82 


JVOTES. 


master  were  not  interrupted  during  the  campaign  of  1443,  when  Alfonso 
took  the  field.  .  .  .  The  Neapolitan  captains  might  be  seen  gathered 
round  their  monarch,  listening  to  the  scholar's  exposition  of  Livy, 
instead  of  wasting  their  leisure  in  games  of  hazard.  Beccadelli  him- 
self professes  to  have  cured  an  illness  of  Alfonso's  in  three  days  by  read- 
ing aloud  to  him  Curtius's  Life  of  Alexander.  .  .  .  When  the  Venetians 
sent  him  one  of  the  recently  discovered  bones  of  Livy,  he  received  it 
like  the  relic  of  a  saint,  nor  could  the  fears  of  his  physiciahs  prevent 
him  from  opening  and  reading  the  MS.  of  Livy  forwarded  from  Florence 
by  Cosimo  de'  Medici,  who  was  then  suspected  of  wishing  to  poison 
him." 

14  21.  Makeih  a  point,    Cometh  to  an  end  or  focus. 

14  29.  Compare  we,  etc.  Bacon  follows  Sidney  in  regarding  this 
classification  as  exhaustive  in  respect  to  human  learning.  Cf.  De  Aug- 
mentis  2.  I  (  Works  4.  293)  :  "  Wherefore  from  these  three  fountains. 
Memory,  Imagination,  and  Reason,  flow  these  three  emanations,  His- 
tory, Poesy,  and  Philosophy;  and  there  can  be  no  others.  For  I  con- 
sider history  and  experience  to  be  the  same  thing,  as  also  philosophy 
and  the  sciences." 

14  32.   The  divine.    Cf.  23  13-14. 

15  3.  Formidi7te,  Qic.  From  Horace,  ^//.f/.  I.  16.  52-3  :  "Through 
love  of  virtue  good  men  shrink  from  sin :  you  commit  no  crime,  because 
you  fear  punishment." 

15  4.  Doth  not  endeavor.    Cf.  38  18. 

15  10.  Naughtiness.    Wickedness.    Cf.  27  21,  31. 

15  13.  Manners.  With  the  sense  of  the  Latin  mores,  including 
morals  as  well  as  manners.  Cf.  his  letter  to  his  brother  Robert,  quoted 
in  Fox  Bourne,  Memoir,  p.  223 :  "  For  he  (i.e.  Homer)  doth  not  mean 
by  mores  how  to  look  or  put  off  one's  cap  with  a  new-found  grace, 
although  true  behavior  is  not  to  be  despised.  .  .  .  But  7nores  he  takes 
for  that  from  whence  moral  philosophy  is  so  called." 

15  19.  Bare.    Cf.  245. 

15  20.  Misty,    Cf.  30  19,  36  1,  47  8. 

15  24.  Happy  is  that  man,  etc.    Cf.  18  12-13,  25  11-14. 

15  27.  Particular  truth,  etc.    Cf.  15  34-35,  18  29-35. 

15  34.  So  as.  So  that.  Cf.  5  5,  7  31-32,  18  12,  28  3-4,  29  5,  33  6,  35  34, 
40  30,  43  4,  20,  50  8,  and  20 1,  note. 

16  2.    Wordish.    Cf.  55  3. 

16  6.    Who.    Cf.  42  20,  43  30;  and  see  43  16. 

16  8.  Gorgeous  palace.  Cf.  Shak.  Rom.  3.  2.  85;  Rich.  II.  3.  3.  148; 
Temp.  4.  152,    Architector.  Architect. 


NOTES. 


83 


16 12.  Lively.  Living.  Cf.  36  34  lifelike),  and  its  use  as  an 
adverb,  56  1. 

16  21.  If  they  be  not  illuminated^  etc.  Cf.  Shelley,  Defense  of  Poetry  : 
"  Ethical  science  arranges  the  elements  which  poetry  has  created,  and 
propounds  schemes  and  proposes  examples  of  civil  and  domestic  life : 
nor  is  it  for  want  of  admirable  doctrines  that  men  hate,  and  despise, 
and  censure,  and  deceive,  and  subjugate  one  another.  But  poetry  acts 
in  another  and  diviner  manner.  .  .  .  The  great  instrument  of  moral 
good  is  the  imagination;  and  poetry  administers  to  the  effect  by  acting 
upon  the  cause."  And  see  also  Emerson,  Essay  on  Books:  "The 
imagination  infuses  a  certain  volatility  and  intoxication.  It  has  a  flute 
which  sets  the  atoms  of  our  frame  in  a  dance,  like  planets;  and,  once 
so  liberated,  the  whole  man  reeling  drunk  to  the  music,  they  never  quite 
subside  to  their  old  stony  state.  But  what  is  the  imagination?  Only 
an  arm  or  weapon  of  the  interior  energy;  only  the  precursor  of  the 
reason." 

16  25.  Anchises,    Cf.  JEneid  2.  634-650. 

16  26.  Ulysses,  Cf.  6)^/j/jj^jj/ 5.  149-158  :  "  But  the  lady  nymph  went 
on  her  way  to  the  great-hearted  Odysseus,  when  she  had  heard  the 
message  of  Zeus.  And  there  she  found  him  sitting  on  the  shore,  and 
his  eyes  were  never  dry  of  tears,  and  his  sweet  life  was  ebbing  away 
as  he  mourned  for  his  return;  for  the  nymph  no  more  found  favor  in 
his  sight.  .  .  .  And  in  the  day-time  he  would  sit  on  the  rocks  and  on 
the  beach,  straining  his  soul  with  tears,  and  groans,  and  griefs,  and 
through  his  tears  he  would  look  wistfully  over  the  unharvested  deep." 

16  28.  Barren  and  beggarly.  Homer  frequently  calls  Ithaca  *  rocky ' 
and  'rugged.'  Cf.  Odyssey  I.  247.  Modern  writers  confirm  this 
description. 

16  29.  Short  madness.  The  current  form  of  the  proverb  is  found  in 
Horace,  Ep.  I.  2.  62,  but  Sidney  refers  to  Seneca,  On  Anger  i.  i. 
Ajax.    In  Sophocles'  drama  of  that  name. 

16  35.  Ulysses.  Cf.  Shelley,  Defense  of  Poetry  :  "  Homer  embodied 
the  ideal  perfection  of  his  age  in  human  character;  nor  can  we  doubt 
that  those  who  read  his  verses  were  awakened  to  an  ambition  of 
becoming  like  to  Achilles,  Hector,  and  Ulysses." 

17 1.  Nisus  and  Euryalus.  Cf.  Virgil,  jEneid  9.  176-182,  433- 
445 :  "  Nisus  was  guard  of  the  gate,  right  valiant  in  arms,  son  of 
Hyrtacus;  whom  Ida,  the  hunter's  hill,  had  sent  to  follow  ^neas; 
quick  was  Nisus  with  the  dart  and  flying  arrows;  by  his  side  was  his 
companion  Euryalus;  there  was  not  a  fairer  than  he  among  all  the 
men  of  ^neas,  who  had  put  on  Trojan  arms;  the  unshorn  cheeks  of 


84 


NOTES. 


the  boy  were  just  streaked  with  the  early  down  of  youth.  One  love 
the  two  did  feel,  together  to  the  wars  they  rushed.  .  .  .  Euryalus 
falls  and  writhes  in  death,  and  the  blood  gushes  o'er  his  lovely  limbs, 
and  his  neck  sinking  down  reclines  on  his  shoulder.  Even  as  when  a 
bright  flower  cut  down  by  the  plough  languishes  in  death,  or  when 
poppies  droop  their  heads  with  weary  neck,  if  perchance  they  are 
burdened  with  a  weight  of  rain.  But  Nisus  rushes  into  the  midst; 
among  them  all  he  makes  for  Volscens  alone,  on  Volscens  alone  are 
his  efforts  bent.  Around  him  the  foes  collect,  they  close  in  fight,  they 
push  him  back  on  either  side.  He  presses  on  with  no  less  zeal,  he 
whirls  his  flashing  sword,  until  he  has  buried  it  full  in  the  shouting 
Rutulian's  mouth,  and  in  the  act  of  death  he  takes  his  enemy's  life. 
Then  he  threw  himself  on  his  lifeless  friend,  pierced  with  many  a 
wound,  and  there  at  last  reposed  in  tranquil  death." 

17  3.   (Edipus.    In  Sophocles'  play  of  CEdipus  King. 

17  4.  Agamemnon,    In  ^schylus'  play  of  that  name. 

17  5.  Atreus.    Cf.  ^Eschylus'  Agamemnon,  1555-1580. 

17  6.  Theban  brothers.  Eteocles  and  Polynices.  See  ^schylus* 
Seven  against  Thebes.    Sour  sweetness.    Cf.  Shak.  Rich.  II.  5.  5.  42. 

17  7.  Medea.  See  the  Medea  of  Euripides.  Gnatho.  A  parasite  in 
Terence's  comedy.  The  Eunuch  ;  cf.  the  English  adjective  gnathottic. 

17  8.  Pandar.  In  Chaucer's  Troilus  and  Cressida  ;  cf.  the  English 
noun  pander. 

17  12.  See  through  them.    Cf.  the  compounds  in  18  3,  32  19. 
17  15.  Feigned  Cyrus  in  Xenophon.    Cf.  19  10-11. 

1716.  ^neas.    Cf.  30  32  ff. 

17 17.  Utopia.  Cf.  Jowett's  remarks  in  his  translation  of  Plato, 
3,  186-8:  "The  *  Utopia'  of  Sir  Thomas  More  is  a  surprising  monu- 
ment of  his  genius,  and  shows  a  reach  of  thought  far  beyond  his  con- 
temporaries. The  book  was  written  by  him  at  the  age  of  about  34, 
and  is  full  of  the  generous  sentiments  of  youth.  He  brings  the  light 
of  Plato  to  bear  upon  the  miserable  state  of  his  own  country.  .  .  He 
is  gifted  with  far  greater  dramatic  invention  than  any  one  who  suc- 
ceeded him,  with  the  exception  of  Swift.  .  .  .  More  is  as  free  as  Plato 
from  the  prejudices  of  his  age,  and  far  more  tolerant." 

17  28.  Mediocribus,  etc.  Yxom  Horace,  Art  of  Poetry  372-3: 
"  Mediocrity  in  poets  is  condemned  by  gods  and  men,  aye,  and  book- 
sellers too." 

17  32.  Our  Saviour,  etc.  Cf.  Harington  (Haslewood,  2.  131): 
"  But,  to  go  higher,  did  not  our  Saviour  himself  speak  in  parables  ?  — 
as  that  divine  parable  of  the  Sower,  that  comfortable  parable  of  the 


NOTES. 


85 


Prodigal  Son,  that  dreadful  parable  of  Dives  and  Lazarus,  though  I 
know  of  this  last,  many  of  the  Fathers  hold  that  it  is  a  story  indeed, 
and  no  parable." 

17  34.  Dives.    Luke  i6.  19-31. 

18  1.    Thai.    Like  the  Latin  emphatic  ille.    Cf.  53  18,  53  23. 

18  2.  Lost  child.    The  parable  of  the  Prodigal  Son,  Luke  15.  II-32. 
18  10.  Parables.    Bacon,  Adv.  Learning  2.  I.  I :  "Parables,  which 
is  divine  poesy." 

18  15.  Popular.  Cf.  2514-15,  and  Harington  (Haslewood,  2.  125): 
"  Such  are  the  pleasant  writings  of  learned  poets,  that  are  the  popular 
philosophers  and  the  popular  divines." 

18  24.  Fantastically.  Fancifully,  imaginatively.  Cf.  note  on  37  34, 
and  Shak.  Macb.  i.  3.  53,  139. 

18  25.  Discourse  of  Poesy.  Cf.  43  28.  The  passage  referred  to  is 
from  the  beginning  of  the  ninth  chapter  (9.  1-3),  which  I  thus  trans- 
late :  "  From  the  foregoing  remarks  it  must  also  be  clear  that  the  task 
of  the  poet  as  such  is  not  to  relate  actual  occurrences  exactly  as  they 
took  place,  but  rather  to  give  an  air  of  verisimilitude  to  what  might 
happen,  and  to  depict  the  possible  in  such  a  way  as  to  make  it  seem 
either  probable  or  necessary.  The  real  distinction  between  the  poet 
and  the  historian  is  not  found  in  the  employment  of  verse  by  the 
former,  and  of  prose  by  the  latter,  for,  if  we  suppose  the  history  of 
Herodotus  to  be  versified,  it  would  be  nothing  but  history  still,  only 
now  in  a  metrical  form.  The  true  ground  of  difference  is  that  the  his- 
torian relates  what  has  taken  place,  the  poet  how  certain  things  might 
have  taken  place.  Hence  poetry  is  of  a  more  philosophical  and  serious 
character  than  history;  it  is,  we  might  say,  more  universal  and  more 
ideal.  Poetry  deals  with  the  general,  history  with  the  particular.  Now 
the  general  shows  how  certain  typical  characters  will  speak  and  act, 
according  to  the  law  of  probability  or  of  necessity,  as  poetry  indicates 
by  bestowing  certain  names  upon  these  characters,  but  the  particular 
merely  relates  what  Alcibiades,  a  historic  individual,  actually  did  or 
suffered."    See  also  10  24,  49  6  ff. 

18  34.  The  particular  only  marketh^  etc.  Cf.  Shelley,  Defense  of 
Poetry :  "There  is  this  difference  between  a  story  and  a  poem,  that  a 
story  is  a  catalogue  of  detached  facts,  which  have  no  other  connexion 
than  time,  place,  circumstances,  cause,  and  effect;  the  other  is  the 
creation  of  actions  according  to  the  unchangeable  forms  of  human 
nature,  as  existing  in  the  mind  of  the  creator,  which  is  itself  the  image 
of  all  other  minds.  .  .  .  Time,  which  destroys  the  beauty  and  the  use 
of  the  story  of  particular  facts,  stripped  of  the  poetry  which  should 


86 


NOTES. 


invest  them,  augments  that  of  poetry,  and  for  ever  developes  new  and 
wonderful  apphcations  of  the  eternal  truth  which  it  contains." 

19  1.    Which  reason^  etc.    Cf.  note  on  54  32. 

19 10.   Was.    Cf.  19  32.    Doctrinable.  Instructive. 
M         19  11.  Justin.    A  writer  of  the  second  century  A.D.,  author  of  an 
abridgment  of  the  older  history  of  Pompeius  Trogus,  who  was  nearly 
contemporary  with  Livy.    The  account  of  Cyrus  is  in  Justin  i.  4-8,  and 
is  probably  based  upon  that  in  Herodotus. 

19 12.  Dares  Phrygius.  An  apocryphal  history  of  the  Trojan  war 
passed  current  in  the  Middle  Ages  under  this  name,  and  was  regarded 
as  the  authentic  account  of  an  eye-witness  and  participant,  since  Homer 
actually  mentions  a  certain  Dares,  Iliad  5.  9:  "Now  there  was  amid 
the  Trojans  one  Dares,  rich  and  noble,  priest  of  Hephaistos."  •Scaliger, 
in  his  Poetics,  still  assumes  that  the  history  is  true,  and  Sidney  appar- 
ently follows  him. 

19  16.  Horace.  In  his  Fifth  Epode,  and  again  in  the  Eighth  Satire 
of  the  First  Book,  Horace  describes  the  witch  Canidia.  Both  descrip- 
tions recall  the  witch  scenes  in  Macbeth.  The  beginning  of  the 
description  in  the  Eighth  Satire  is  as  follows,  23-28 :  "  I  myself  saw 
Canidia  stalking  along  with  her  sable  robe  tucked  up,  naked  were  her 
feet,  dishevelled  her  hair,  she  howled  in  company  with  the  elder 
Sagana;  their  ghastly  color  made  them  both  horrible  to  look  on.  Then 
they  began  to  scrape  the  earth  with  their  nails,  and  to  tear  with  their 
teeth  a  black  lamb." 

19  19.   Tantalus.    Cf.  Euripides,  Orestes  i^-\o\ 

E'en  Tantalus,  the  son  of  Jove  the  blest 
(Not  to  malign  his  fate),  hangs  in  the  air, 
And  trembles  at  the  rock  which  o'er  his  head 
Projects  its  threatening  mass ;  a  punishment 
They  say,  for  that,  to  heaven's  high  feast  admitted, 
A  mortal  equal  with  the  immortals  graced. 
He  curbed  not  the  intemperance  of  his  tongue. 

And  Cicero,  Tusc.  Disp.  4.  16.  35:  "The  poets,  to  express  the  great- 
ness of  this  evil,  imagine  a  stone  to  hang  over  the  head  of  Tantalus, 
as  a  punishment  for  his  wickedness,  his  pride,  and  his  boasting.  And 
this  is  the  common  punishment  of  folly;  for  there  hangs  over  the  head 
of  every  one  whose  mind  revolts  from  reason  some  similar  fear." 

19  21.  Where.  Whereas.  So  in  19  3,  24  22,  29  35,  41  18,  21,  25,  50  20; 
but  whereas y  19  27. 

19  22.   Without.    Unless.    Cf.  33  22,  36 10. 


NOTES. 


87 


19  25.  Misliked.    Disliked.    Cf.  21  17,  24,  25,  40  19. 

19  27.  Qtiintus  Curtius.  A  Latin  writer  who  probably  lived  in  the 
time  of  the  Emperor  Claudius,  and  who  wrote  a  history  of  Alexander 
the  Great  in  ten  books,  eight  of  which  have  been  preserved. 

20  1.  So  .  .  .  as.  So  .  .  .  that.  Cf.  21  18,  25  5,  28  10,  33  34,  34  2-3. 
20  13.  Zopyrus.    The  story  is  related  by  Herodotus,  3.  153-160,  and 

by  Justin  in  i.  10.    Cervantes  refers  to  it,  Don  Quixote,  Bk.  i.  ch.  47. 
20 20.    Tarquiitius.    Related  by  Livy,  I.  53-54. 

20  22.  Abradaias.  Sidney  no  doubt  means  Gadatas;  cf.  the  Cyro- 
pccdia,  Bk.  5.  ch.  3. 

21  4.   To.    As  to. 

21  5.  Learning  is  gotten.    Omission  of  the  relative,  as  in  43  16. 

21  7.  Virtue  exalted  and  vice  punished.  Cf.  Bacon,  Adv.  Learning 
2.  4.  1-2:  "In  the  latter  it  is  (i.e.  in  respect  of  matter  poesy  is)  .  .  . 
one  of  the  principal  portions  of  learning,  and  is  nothing  else  but 
feigned  history,  which  may  be  styled  as  well  in  prose  as  in  verse.  The 
use  of  this  feigned  history  hath  been  to  give  some  shadow  of  satisfac- 
tion to  the  mind  of  man  in  those  points  wherein  the  nature  of  things 
doth  deny  it,  the  world  being  in  proportion  inferior  to  the  soul;  by 
reason  whereof  there  is,  agreeable  to  the  spirit  of  man,  a  more  ample 
greatness,  a  more  exact  goodness,  and  a  more  absolute  variety,  than 
can  be  found  in  the  nature  of  things.  Therefore,  because  the  acts  or 
events  of  true  history  have  not  that  magnitude  which  satisfieth  the 
mind  of  man,  poesy  feigneth  acts  and  events  greater  and  more  heroical. 
Because  true  history  propoundeth  the  successes  and  issues  of  actions 
not  so  agreeable  to  the  merits  of  virtue  and  vice,  therefore  poesy  feigns 
them  more  just  in  retribution,  and  more  according  to  revealed  provi- 
dence. Because  true  history  representeth  actions  and  events  more 
ordinary  and  less  interchanged,  therefore  poesy  endueth  them  with 
more  rareness,  and  more  unexpected  and  alternative  variations.  So 
as  it  appeareth  that  poesy  serveth  and  conferreth  to  magnanimity, 
morality,  and  to  delectation.  And  therefore  it  was  ever  thought  to 
have  some  participation  of  divineness,  because  it  doth  raise  and  erect 
the  mind,  by  submitting  the  shows  of  things  to  the  desires  of  the  mind; 
whereas  reason  doth  buckle  and  bow  the  mind  unto  the  nature  of 
things.  And  we  see  that  by  these  insinuations  and  congruities  v/ith 
man's  nature  and  pleasure,  joined  also  with  the  agreement  and  consort 
it  hath  with  music,  it  hath  had  access  and  estimation  in  rude  times  and 
barbarous  regions,  where  other  learning  stood  excluded.'* 

21  11.  LLandmaid.    Cf.  40  2. 

21  12.  Storm.    Odyssey,  Book  V. 


88 


NOTES. 


21  IG.  As  the  tragedy-writer  ansivered.  Cf.  Plutarch,  On  Listening 
to  Poetry  {Morais  2.  54)  :  "  As  Euripides  is  reported,  when  some 
blamed  him  for  bringing  such  an  impious  and  flagitious  villain  as  Ixion 
upon  the  stage,  to  have  given  this  answer :  But  yet  1  brought  him  not 
off  till  I  had  fastened  him  to  a  torturing  wheel." 

21  22.  Miltiades.  Cf.  Cicero,  Republic  I.  3.  5:  "They  tell  us  that 
Miltiades,  the  vanquisher  and  conqueror  of  the  Persians,  before  even 
those  wounds  were  healed  which  he  had  received  in  that  most  glorious 
victory,  wasted  away  in  the  chains  of  his  fellow-citizens  that  life  which 
had  been  preserved  from  the  weapons  of  the  enemy." 

21  23.  Phocion.  Cf.  Plutarch,  Phocion  38  :  "The  proceedings  against 
Phocion  put  the  Greeks  in  mind  of  those  against  Socrates.  The  treat- 
ment of  both  was  equally  unjust,  and  the  calamities  thence  entailed 
upon  Athens  were  perfectly  similar." 

21  24.   Cruel  Severus.    Septimius  Severus. 

21  25.  Excellent  Severus.  Alexander  Severus.  For  an  account  of 
both  these  emperors  see  Gibbon,  Decline  and  Fall,  chs.  5,  6,  and  7. 

Sylla.  Cf.  Mommsen,  Hist.  Pome  (English  tr.)  3.  469 :  "  Little  more 
than  a  year  after  his  retirement,  in  the  sixtieth  year  of  his  life,  while 
yet  vigorous  in  body  and  mind,  he  was  overtaken  by  death;  .  .  .  the 
rupture  of  a  blood-vessel  carried  him  off." 

Marius.  Cf.  Mommsen,  3.  391  :  "A  burning  fever  seized  him; 
after  being  stretched  for  seven  days  on  a  sick  bed,  in  the  wild  fancies 
of  which  he  was  fighting  on  the  fields  of  Asia  Minor  the  battles  whose 
laurels  were  destined  for  Sulla,  he  expired  on  the  13th  Jan.  668  (i.e.  86 
B.C.).  He  died,  more  than  seventy  years  old,  in  full  possession  of  what 
he  called  power  and  honor,  and  in  his  bed;  but  Nemesis  assumes 
various  shapes,  and  does  not  always  expiate  blood  with  blood." 

21  26.  Ponipey.  Cf.  Mommsen,  Hist.  Rome  4.  508 :  "  As  he  was 
stepping  ashore,  the  military  tribune  Lucius  Septimius  stabbed  him 
from  behind,  under  the  eyes  of  his  wife  and  son,  who  were  compelled 
to  be  spectators  of  the  murder  from  the  deck  of  their  vessel,  without 
being  able  to  rescue  or  revenge.  On  the  same  day,  on  which  thirteen 
years  before  he  had  entered  the  capital  in  triumph  over  Mithridates, 
the  man,  who  for  a  generation  had  been  called  the  Great  and  for  years 
had  ruled  Rome,  died  on  the  desert  sands  of  the  inhospitable  Casian 
shore  by  the  hand  of  one  of  his  soldiers." 

Cicero.  Cf.  Plutarch,  Cicero  48  :  "The  tribune,  taking  a  few  soldiers 
with  him,  ran  to  the  end  of  the  walk  where  he  was  to  come  out.  But 
Cicero  perceiving  that  Herennius  was  hastening  after  him,  ordered  his 
servants  to  set  the  litter  down;  and  putting  his  left  hand  to  his  chin, 


NOTES. 


89 


as  it  was  his  custom  to  do,  he  looked  steadfastly  upon  his  murderers. 
wSuch  an  appearance  of  misery  in  his  face,  overgrown  with  hair,  and 
wasted  with  anxiety,  so  much  affected  the  servants  of  Herennius  that 
they  covered  their  faces  during  the  melancholy  scene.  That  officer 
despatched  him,  while  he  stretched  his  neck  out  of  the  litter  to  receive 
the  blow.  Thus  fell  Cicero,  in  the  sixty-fourth  year  of  his  age." 
21  28.    Virtuous  Cato,    Cato  of  Utica. 

21  31.  Ccesar's  own  words.  Reported  by  Suetonius,  Julius  Ccesnr 
77  :  "  Sullam  nescisse  literas,  qui  dictaturam  deposuerit."  This,  which 
would  naturally  be  translated,  "  Sylla  was  an  ignorant  fellow  to  abdi- 
cate the  dictatorship,"  might  also  be  rendered,  "  Sylla  was  an  ignorant 
fellow  to  abdicate  the  office  of  dictating  to  pupils."  This,  as  my  friend 
Professor  Bernadotte  Perrin,  of  Adelbert  University,  to  whom  I  am 
indebted  for  this  reference,  says,  is  "  an  etymological  joke,  and  a  poor 
one."  Sidney  evidently  gathers  from  it  some  such  meaning  as  this: 
"  Sylla  was  without  learning  (a  man  of  untutored  nobleness),  and  for 
this  reason  laid  down  the  dictatorship."    Cf.  Bacon,  Adv.  Z.  i.  7.  29. 

Who.  Caesar.  His  whole  later  career  was  an  undoing  of  Sylla's 
work.  The  beginning  of  it  is  marked  by  Suetonius,  Julius  CcBsar  5  : 
"  Having  been  elected  military  tribune,  the  first  honor  he  received  from 
the  suffra^s  of  the  people  after  his  return  to  Rome,  he  zealously 
assisted  those  who  took  measures  for  restoring  the  tribunitian  authority, 
which  had  been  greatly  diminished  during  the  usurpation  of  Sylla." 

22  1.  In  hell.  So  by  Virgil  in  the  Sixth  Book  of  the  ^neid,  and  by 
Homer  in  the  Eleventh  Book  of  the  Odyssey. 

22  2.  Occidendos  esse.  That  they  are  to  be  slain.  Cf.  the  note  on 
Phalaris  below. 

22  3.  Cypselus,  Feriaftder.  Cf.  Herodotus  5.  92:  "And  Cypselus, 
having  obtained  the  tyranny,  behaved  himself  thus :  he  banished  many 
of  the  Corinthians,  deprived  many  of  their  property,  and  many  more 
of  their  life.  When  he  had  reigned  thirty  years,  and  ended  his  life 
happily,  his  son  Periander  became  his  successor  in  the  tyranny.  Now 
Periander  at  first  was  more  mild  than  his  father;  but  when  he  had 
communicated  by  embassadors  with  Thrasybulus,  tyrant  of  Miletus,  he 
became  far  more  cruel  than  Cypselus;  .  .  .  whatever  Cypselus  had 
left  undone,  by  killing  and  banishing,  Periander  completed." 

22  4.  Phalaris.  Cf.  Cicero,  On  Duties  2.  632 :  "  Now,  as  to  what 
relates  to  Phalaris,  the  decision  is  very  easy;  for  we  have  no  society 
with  tyrants,  but  rather  the  widest  separation  from  them;  nor  is  it  con- 
trary to  nature  to  despoil,  if  you  can,  him  whom  it  is  a  virtue  to  slay  — 
and  this  pestilential  and  impious  class  ought  to  be  entirely  exterminated 
from  the  community  of  mankind." 


90 


NOTES. 


Dionysius.    Dionysius  the  Elder,  tyrant  of  Syracuse.    Cf.  Cicero, 
Tusc.  Disp.  5.  20-22,  57-63. 
22  11.  Laurel  crown,    Cf.  32  6,  44  9,  45  8. 

22  12.   Victorious.    Note  the  double  construction,  with  of  and  with 

over. 

22  14.  For  suppose,  etc.    Cf.  35  12-14. 

22 18.  ^Lko(pL\6(ro(pos,  A  friend  to  the  philosopher.  Apparently 
coined  by  Sidney. 

22  26.  TvCodLs.  Knowledge.  Tlpa^is.  Practice.  Cf.  Aristotle,  Ethics 
1.3:  "  For  the  true  object  of  ethical  study  is  not  merely  the  knowledge 
of  what  is  good,  but  the  application  of  that  knowledge." 

22  30-32.  As  ivell  .  .  ,  as  .  »  ,  as.    Note  the  peculiar  structure. 

23  2.  Beholding.    Beholden.    Now  obsolete  in  this  sense. 

23  12.  Hoc  opus,  hie  labor  est.  This  is  the  task,  this  the  struggle. 
Virgil,  jE^ieid  6.  129. 

23  21.  M argent.  This,  and  not  margin,  is  the  regular  Shakespearian 
form. 

23  25.  Forsooth.    Cf.  25  14. 

23  26.  A  tale,  etc.  Cf.  Harington  (Haslewood,  2.  133)  :  "They  pre- 
sent unto  us  a  pretty  tale,  able  to  keep  a  child  from  play,  and  an  old 
man  from  the  chimney  corner."  ^ 

23  31.  Pleasant  taste.  Cf.  23  19,  25  2.  A  striking  parallel  to  this  is 
found  in  a  book  which  we  know  Sidney  had  consulted  (cf.  9  24  note), 
the  edition  of  the  Bible  by  Tremellius  and  Junius.  I  translate  from  the 
Preface  to  Part  III. :  "  For  when  the  Holy  Spirit  saw  that  mankind 
could  scarcely  be  persuaded  to  the  practice  of  virtue,  and  that  we, 
being  inclined  by  the  wickedness  of  our  nature  to  sensual  delights, 
neglected  the  rule  of  right  living,  what  did  He  do?  In  the  midst  of 
His  graver  instructions  He  scattered  the  alluring  harmonies  of  song, 
that  while  our  ears  were  attuned  to  their  sweetness  and  grace,  we  might 
imperceptibly  descry  the  lessons  which  the  words  convey,  just  as  expe- 
rienced physicians  do,  who,  when  they  would  administer  unpleasant 
medicines  to  the  sick,  are  wont  to  smear  the  mouth  of  the  cup  with 
honey,  lest  the  bitterness  of  the  drug  cause  the  patient  to  refuse  its 
virtue."  He  may  also  have  seen  the  same  idea  expressed  in  Tasso  I.  3, 
here  given  in  Fairfax's  translation : 

Thither,  thou  know'st,  the  world  is  best  inclined 
Where  luring  Parnass  most  his  sweet  imparts, 
And  truth  conveyed  in  verse  of  gentle  kind, 
To  read  perhaps  will  move  the  dullest  hearts ; 


NOTES. 


91 


So  we,  if  children  young  diseased  we  find, 
Anoint  with  sweets  the  vessel's  foremost  parts, 
To  make  them  taste  the  potions  sharp  we  give ; 
They  drink  deceived,  and  so  deceived  they  live. 

Cf.  also  Gosson,  School  of  Abuse,  p.  20:  "The  deceitful  physician 
giveth  sweet  syrups,  to  make  his  poison  go  down  the  smoother." 
All  of  these  go  back  to  Lucretius,  i.  936-950:  "  But  even  as  physicians 
when  they  purpose  to  give  nauseous  wormwood  to  children,  first  smear 
the  rim  round  the  bowl  with  the  sweet  yellow  juice  of  honey,  that  the 
unthinking  age  of  children  may  be  fooled  as  far  as  the  lips,  and  mean- 
while drink  up  the  bitter  draught  of  wormwood  and  though  beguiled 
yet  not  be  betrayed,  but  rather  by  such  means  recover  health  and 
strength;  so  I  now,  since  this  doctrine  seems  generally  somewhat 
bitter  to  those  by  whom  it  has  not  been  handled,  and  the  multitude 
shrinks  back  from  it  in  dismay,  I  have  resolved  to  set  forth  to  you  our 
doctrine  in  sweet-toned  Pierian  verse  and  o'erlay  it  as  it  were  with  the 
pleasant  honey  of  the  Muses,  if  haply  by  such  means  I  might  engage 
your  mind  on  my  verses,  till  such  time  as  you  clearly  perceive  with 
what  shape  the  whole  nature  of  things  has  been  put  together." 

23  31.    Which.    Referring  to  persons.    Cf.  23  35. 

24  1.  Cradled  in  their  graves.  Note  this  highly  poetical  expression. 
24  8.  As  Aristotle  saith.    I  translate  from  Poetics  4.  2.  3:  "For 

imitation  is  inbred  in  men  from  childhood.  And  they  differ  in  this 
respect  from  other  living  beings  that  they  are  the  most  imitative,  and 
acquire  their  first  learning  through  imitation,  and  that  they  all  take 
pleasure  in  the  products  of  the  mimetic  art.  This  is  proved  by  experi- 
ence. The  pictures  of  those  very  things  which  in  themselves  are  dis- 
agreeable to  look  on,  these  pictures,  though  painted  with  the  utmost 
accuracy,  we  are  delighted  to  gaze  at,  such,  for  example,  as  those  of  the 
vilest  animals  or  of  dead  bodies." 

24  12.  A?}iadis  de  Gaule.  A  contemporary  French  critic,  Baret,  in 
a  learned  monograph  on  the  Amadis  de  Gaule  (Paris,  1873),  says 
(p.  143)  :  "  In  every  other  respect  the  Amadis  is  an  exact  reproduction 
of  antique  chivalric  sentiments.  Martial  enthusiasm  linked  with  the 
adoration  of  woman;  religious  faith;  the  inviolability  of  a  promise 
once  given ;  the  constant  endeavor  to  maintain  the  right  of  the  weak 
by  reason  or  by  arms;  honor  and  loyalty  regarded  as  dearer  than  life 
itself;  all  these  noble  and  useful  virtues  are  to  be  found  in  the  knights 
gathered  round  King  Lisuarte,  no  less  than  in  those  who  adorned  the 
court  of  King  Arthur." 

24  15.  Courage.    Cf.  29  20-35,  35  2,  38  29-32,  39  24. 


92 


NOTES, 


24  15.   Ca7'rying  old  Anchises.    ^w^zV  2.  705-804. 

24  20.  Fugieniefu,  etc.  y^neid  1 2.  645-6 :  "  Shall  this  land  see 
Turnus  a  fugitive?    Is  it  so  passing  hard  to  die?  " 

24  26.  Plato  and  Boethius.  Plato  frequently  quotes  from  Homer. 
For  Boethius  cf.  26  24. 

24  30.  Indiilgere  genio.  Referring  to  Persius,  Sat.  5.  151  :  "Give 
your  genius  play;  let  us  take  pleasure  as  it  comes;  life  is  ours  and  it 
is  all  we  have." 

25  6.  Menenius  Agj-ippa.  The  story  is  told  by  Livy,  2.  32.  Cf.  also 
Shak.  Cor.  i.  i.  99-158. 

25  11.  Far-fet.    Far-fetched.    Cf.  53  2. 
25  23.  As.  That. 

25  27.  Nathaii.  See  2  Sam.  12,  and  cf.  36  11,  below.  Sidney's  words 
are  echoed  by  Harington  (Haslewood,  2.  131). 

26  1.  In  a  glass.  Cf.  28  24,  46 14.  Filthiiiess.  Cf.  the  use  of  the 
same  word  in  the  rendering  of  this  very  Psalm  of  Mercy  by  Sidney's 
sister : 

For  I,  alas,  acknowledging  do  know 

My  filthy  fault ;  my  faulty  filthiness 

To  my  soul's  eye  uncessantly  doth  show. 

Which  done  to  thee,  to  thee  I  do  confess, 

Just  judge,  true  witness  ;  that  for  righteousness 

Thy  doom  may  pass  against  my  guilt  awarded, 

Thy  evidence  for  truth  may  be  regarded. 

26  8.  So  poetry,  etc.    Cf.  30  28  ff. 

26  17.  Defections.    Cf.  48  2. 

26  22.   Tragi-comical.    Cf.  50  10-14. 

26  23.  Sannazzaro.  A  Neapohtan  scholar  and  poet  (1458-1530) 
the  author  of  the  Arcadia.  Cf.  Symonds,  Renaissance  in  Italy  5.  197, 
211:  "To  Sannazzaro  belongs  the  glory  of  having  first  explored  Arcadia, 
mapped  out  its  borders,  and  called  it  after  his  own  name.  He  is  the 
Columbus  of  this  visionary  hemisphere.  .  .  .  For  English  students  the 
Arcadia  has  a  special  interest,  since  it  begot  the  longer  and  more 
ambitious  work  of  Sir  Phihp  Sidney.  Hitherto  I  have  spoken  only 
of  its  prose;  but  the  book  blends  prose  and  verse  in  alternating 
sections." 

26  24.  Boethius.  Cf.  Morley,  First  Sketch  of  Eng.  Lit.,  pp.  24-5  : 
"  Boethius,  a  Roman  senator,  lost  the  favour  of  Theodoric  by  a  love  for 
his  country,  which  his  enemies  called  treason,  was  imprisoned,  and 
from  prison  led  to  execution,  about  the  year  525.  In  prison  he  wrote 
his  noble  work  called  The  Consolation  of  Philosophy^  in  five  books  of 


NOTES, 


93 


prose,  mixed  with  verse.  The  first  of  its  five  books  recognised  as  the 
great  source  of  consolation  that  a  wise  God  rules  the  world;  the  second 
argued  that  man  in  his  worst  extremity  possesses  much,  and  ought  to 
fix  his  mind  on  the  imperishable;  the  third  maintained  that  God  is  the 
chief  good,  and  works  no  evil;  the  fourth,  that,  as  seen  from  above, 
only  the  good  are  happy;  and  the  fifth  sought  to  reconcile  God's 
knowledge  of  what  is  necessary  with  the  freewill  of  mankind." 

26  34.  MelibcEus\    Cf.  Virgil's  First  Eclogue, 

27  1.   Tityrus,    See  last  note. 

27  3.  Wolves  and  sheep.  Probably  referring  to  Spenser,  Ninth 
Eclogue  (September)  of  the  Shepherd^s  Calertder,  If  so,  it  is  easier  to 
understand  why  Sidney's  judgment  upon  Spenser's  work  (cf.  47  16-19)  is 
so  harsh. 

27  7.  Strave.    Cf.  41  17,  and  the  note  on  1  27. 

27 10.  Hcec  memini^  etc.  Virgil,  Eel.  7.  69-70:  "These  verses  I 
remember,  and  how  the  vanquished  Thyrsis  vainly  strove.  From  that 
day  it  has  been  with  us  Corydon,  none  but  Corydon." 

27  12.  Which.  But  Sidney  immediately  passes  over  to  personifica- 
tion, as  in  the  characterization  of  the  other  species  below. 

27  14.  Heraclitus.  Cf.  Seneca,  On  Attger  2.  10.  5  :  "  Heraclitus,  as 
often  as  he  went  forth  a-doors,  and  saw  about  him  such  a  multitude  of 
evil  livers,  nay,  rather,  men  dying  wickedly,  he  wept,  having  com- 
passion on  all  those  that  met  him  with  a  joyful  and  contented  coun- 
tenance." 

27  23.  Omne  vafer^  etc.  Condensed  from  a  couplet  of  Persius,  Sat, 
I.  1 16-7: 

Omne  vafer  vitium  ridenti  Flaccus  amico 
Tangit,  et  admissus  circum  praecordia  ludit, 

Conington  thus  translates :  "  Horace,  the  rogue,  manages  to  probe  every 
fault  while  making  his  friend  laugh ;  he  gains  his  entrance,  and  plays 
about  the  innermost  feelings."  Gildersleeve,  in  his  edition  of  Persius, 
would  translate  prcecordia  by  *  heart-strings.'  Gosson  quotes  the  coup- 
let, p.  31. 

27  28.   Circum  prcecordia  ludit.    See  last  note. 

27  30.  Est  Ulubris,  etc.  Modified  from  Horace,  Epist.  I.  II.  30, 
which  has  te  for  nos.    Lines  25  to  30  are  thus  translated  by  Howes : 

For  if  'tis  wisdom  gives  content  and  ease  — 
Not  a  fair  prospect  of  expanded  seas, 
Who  roam  abroad  from  shore  to  shore,  shall  find 
They  change  the  climate  only,  not  the  mind. 


94 


NOTES. 


Idly  alert  we  traverse  sea  and  land 

In  quest  of  happiness  that  lies  at  hand. 

Let  but  good  sense  each  fretful  whim  control 

And  tranquillize  the  tumults  of  the  soul, 

'Tis  here  —  'tis  anywhere  :  you  cannot  miss  ; 

And  Ulubrae  may  prove  the  seat  of  bliss. 

UlubrjE  was  a  town  of  Latium  proverbial  for  its  desolation.    Cf.  Juvenal 
lo.  102;  Cicero,  Familiar  Letters  7.  18.  3. 
27  32.   Justly.    Cf.  47  28-9. 

27  33.  Argument  of  abuse.  The  first  direct  reference  to  Gosson's 
diatribe.    Cf.  34  31,  37  30,  38  7  ff.,  42  9-10,  43  4,  52  8,  and  especially  38  28. 

28  1.    The  comedy.    Cf.  28  26-27,  50  21. 

28  8.  Wanteth  a  great  foil.  Cf.  Milton,  Areopagitica  :  "Good  and 
evil  we  know  in  the  field  of  this  world  grow  up  together  almost  insep- 
arably; and  the  knowledge  of  good  is  so  involved  and  interwoven  with 
the  knowledge  of  evil,  and  in  so  many  cunning  resemblances  hardly  to 
be  discerned,  that  those  confused  seeds  which  were  imposed  upon 
Psyche  as  an  incessant  labor  to  cull  out  and  sort  asunder,  were  not 
more  intermixed.  It  was  out  the  rind  of  one  apple  tasted,  that  the 
knowledge  of  good  and  evil,  as  two  twins  cleaving  together,  leaped 
forth  into  the  world.  And  perhaps  this  is  that  doom  which  Adam  fell 
into  of  knowing  good  and  evil;  that  is  to  say,  of  knowing  good  by  evil. 

"As  therefore  the  state  of  man  now  is,  what  wisdom  can  there  be 
to  choose,  what  continence  to  forbear,  without  the  knowledge  of  evil? 
He  that  can  apprehend  and  consider  vice  with  all  her  baits  and  seem- 
ing pleasures,  and  yet  abstain,  and  yet  distinguish  and  yet  prefer  that 
which  is  truly  better,  he  is  the  true  warfaring  Christian.  I  cannot 
praise  a  fugitive  and  cloistered  virtue  unexercised  and  unbreathed,  that 
never  sallies  out  and  seeks  her  adversary,  but  slinks  out  of  the  race, 
where  that  immortal  garland  is  to  be  run  for  not  without  dust  and 
heat.  Assuredly  we  bring  not  innocence  into  the  world,  we  bring 
impurity  much  rather;  that  which  purifies  us  is  trial,  and  trial  is  by 
what  is  contrary.  That  virtue  therefore  w^hich  is  but  a  youngling  in 
the  contemplation  of  evil,  and  knows  not  the  utmost  that  vice  promises 
to  her  followers,  and  rejects  it,  is  but  a  blank  virtue,  not  a  pure;  her 
whiteness  is  but  an  excremental  whiteness;  which  was  the  reason  why 
our  sage  and  serious  poet  Spenser  (whom  I  dare  be  known  to  think  a 
better  teacher  than  Scotus  or  Aquinas),  describing  true  temperance 
under  the  person  of  Guion,  brings  him  in  with  his  palmer  through  the 
Cave  of  Mammon  and  the  Bower  of  Earthly  Bliss,  that  he  might  see 
and  know,  and  yet  abstain." 


XO  TES. 


95 


So  Bacon,  De  Angme?iiis  7.  2  {Works  5.  17-18)  :  "For  it  is  not 
possible  to  join  the  wisdom  of  the  serpent  with  the  innocence  of  the 
dove,  except  men  be  perfectly  acquainted  with  the  nature  of  evil  itself, 
for  without  this  virtue  is  open  and  unfenced;  nay,  a  virtuous  and  honest 
man  can  do  no  good  upon  those  that  are  wicked,  to  correct  and  reclaim 
them,  without  first  exploring  all  the  depths  and  recesses  of  their  malice. 
For  men  of  corrupted  minds  presuppose  that  honesty  grows  out  of  an 
ignorance  or  simplicity  of  manners,  and  believing  of  preachers,  school- 
masters, books,  moral  precepts,  common  discourses  and  opinions;  so 
as,  except  they  plainly  perceive  that  you  know  as  much  of  their  corrupt 
opinions  and  depraved  principles  as  they  do  themselves,  they  despise 
all  honesty  of  manners  and  counsel."  And  see  also  Plutarch,  On  Listen- 
ing to  Poet?'}'  (^Morals  2.  66)  :  "And  of  this  nature  is  Homer's  poetr}% 
which  totally  bids  adieu  to  Stoicism,  the  principles  whereof  will  not 
admit  any  vice  to  come  near  where  virtue  is,  nor  virtue  to  have  any 
thing  to  do  where  any  vice  lodgeth,  but  affirms  that  he  that  is  not  a 
wise  man  can  do  nothing  well,  and  he  that  is  so  can  do  nothing  amiss. 
Thus  they  determine  in  the  schools.  But  in  human  actions  and  the 
afiairs  of  common  life  the  judgment  of  Euripides  is  verified,  that 

Virtue  and  vice  ne'er  separately  exist, 

But  in  the  same  acts  with  each  other  twist." 

2S  12-13.  Dernea,  etc.  Characters  in  the  plays  of  Terence,  the  Latin 
dramatist :  respectively  a  parsimonious  old  man,  a  slave,  a  parasite,  and 
a  braggart. 

2S  20.  /;/  pistriyium.  This  phrase  is  borrowed  from  Terence  and 
Plautus,  in  whom  the  master,  if  he  wishes  to  bring  a  slave  to  terms, 
threatens  to  send  him  to  labor  in  the  mill.  Thus  Terence,  Andria 
I.  2.  2S:  "  ril  hand  you  over,  Davus,  beaten  with  stripes,  to  the  mill, 
even  to  your  dying  day."  And  Plautus,  Mostella?'ia  i.  i.  16:  "Before 
long  you'll  be  handed  over  to  the  mill.'' 

2S  24.  His  0ZV71  aciio?is.  Cf.  Gosson,  p.  31  :  "Now  are  the  abuses 
of  the  world  revealed;  ever)'  man  in  a  play  may  see  his  own  faults,  and 
learn  by  this  glass  to  amend  his  manners."  Gosson  borrows  this  thought 
from  Cicero.  According  to  Donatus,  "  Cicero  says  that  comedy  is  an 
imitation  of  life,  a  mirror  of  custDms,  an  image  of  truth."  Cf.  Shake- 
speare, Hnil.  3.  2.  23-27:  "The  purpose  of  playing,  whose  end,  both 
at  the  first  and  now,  was  and  is,  to  hold,  as  'twere,  the  mirror  up  to 
nature;  to  show  virtue  her  own  feature,  scorn  her  own  image,  and  the 
very  age  and  body  of  the  time  his  form  and  pressure."  Cf.  also  Hml, 
3.  4.  19-20; 


96 


NOTES, 


You  go  not  till  I  set  you  up  a  glass 
Where  you  may  see  the  inmost  part  of  you. 

28  25.  By  nobody  be  blamed.  See  Shelley,  Defense  of  Poetry  :  "  In 
the  drama  of  the  highest  order  there  is  little  food  for  censure  or  hatred; 
it  teaches  rather  self-knowledge  and  self-respect.  .  .  .  But  in  periods 
of  the  decay  of  social  Hfe,  the  drama  sympathizes  with  that  decay." 
And  again:  "And  it  is  indisputable  that  the  highest  perfection  of 
human  society  has  ever  corresponded  with  the  highest  dramatic  excel- 
lence; and  that  the  corruption  or  the  extinction  of  the  drama  in  a 
nation  where  it  has  once  flourished,  is  a  mark  of  a  corruption  of  man- ' 
ners,  and  an  extinction  of  the  energies  which  sustain  the  soul  of  social 
life." 

28  28.   Covered  with  tissue,    Cf.  Shakespeare,  Hml.  3.  4.  145-150; 

Lay  not  that  flattering  unction  to  your  soul, 
That  not  your  trespass,  but  my  madness  speaks : 
It  will  but  skin  and  film  the  ulcerous  place, 
Whilst  rank  corruption,  mining  all  within. 
Infects  unseen.    Confess  yourself  to  heaven ; 
Repent  what's  past ;  avoid  what  is  to  come. 

28  30.  Admiration  and  commiseration.  Aristotle's  *  awe  and  pity,' 
or  '  fear  (terror)  and  compassion,'  as  his  words  in  the  sixth  chapter 
of  the  Poetics  are  variously  translated.    Cf.  50  22,  52  4. 

28  32.  Gilden.  An  Old  English  form.  Cf.  Astrophel  and  Stella, 
Sonnet  1 1,  "gilden  leaves." 

28  33.  Roofs.    Apparently  =  Lat.  tecta^  dwellings. 

28  34.   Qui  sceptra,  etc.    Seneca,  CEdipus  705-6,  which  I  translate  : 

The  savage  tyrant,  bearing  sternest  rule. 

Dreads  those  who  dread  him,  and  his  fear  recoils 

To  plague  the  inventor. 

29  2.  Alexaitder  PJierccus.  Plutarch,  Pelopidas  29,  relates  of  this 
Alexander  the  incident  to  which  Sidney  alludes :  "  For  he  (i.e.  Epami- 
nondas)  knew  his  savage  disposition,  and  the  little  regard  he  paid  to 
reason  or  justice;  that  he  buried  some  persons  alive,  and  dressed 
others  in  the  skins  of  bears  and  wild  boars,  and  then,  by  way  of  diver- 
sion, baited  them  with  dogs,  or  despatched  them  with  darts;  that  hav- 
ing summoned  the  people  of  Meliboea  and  Scotusa,  towns  in  friendship 
and  alliance  with  him,  to  meet  him  in  full  assembly,  he  surrounded 
them  with  guards,  and  with  all  the  wantonness  of  cruelty  put  them 
to  the  sword.  .  .  .    Yet  upon  seeing  a  tragedian  act  the  Troades  of 


NOTES.  97 

Euripides,  he  went  hastily  out  of  the  theatre,  and  at  the  same  time 
sent  a  message  to  the  actor  not  to  be  discouraged,  but  to  exert  all  his 
skill  in  his  part;  for  it  was  not  out  of  any  dislike  that  he  went  out,  but 
he  was  ashamed  that  his  citizens  should  see  him,  who  never  pitied  those 
he  put  to  death,  weep  at  the  sufferings  of  Hecuba  and  Andromache." 
Plutarch  repeats  this  somewhat  more  dramatically  in  his  Fortune  or 
Virtue  of  Alexander  (^Morals  I.  492). 
29  18.  Lauds  of  the  immortal  God.    Cf.  52  15  ff. 

29  20.  Barbarousness.  Cf.  Child,  Eng.  and  Scott.  Popular  Ballads^ 
Part  VI.  p.  305,  note:  "The  courtly  poet  deserves  much  of  ballad 
lovers  for  avowing  his  barbarousness  (one  doubts  whether  he  seriously 
believed  that  the  gorgeous  Pindar  could  have  improved  upon  the 
ballad),  but  what  would  he  not  have  deserved  if  he  had  written  the 
blind  crowder's  song  down?" 

Percy  and  Douglas.  Cf.  Child,  Ballads^  p.  305 :  "  The  song  of 
Percy  and  Douglas,  then,  was  sung  about  the  country  by  blind  fiddlers 
about  1580  in  a  rude  and  ancient  form,  much  older  than  the  one  that 
has  come  down  to  us;  for  that,  if  heard  by  Sidney,  could  not  have 
seemed  to  him  a  song  of  an  uncivil  age,  meaning  the  age  of  Percy  and 
Douglas,  two  hundred  years  before  his  day.  It  would  give  no  such 
impression  even  now,  if  chanted  to  an  audience  three  hundred  years 
later  than  Sidney." 

29  26.  Hungary.  Where  Sidney  was  for  a  month  or  so,  just  before 
completing  his  nineteenth  year  (August  or  September  to  October,  1573). 
See  Fox  Bourne,  Memoir,  pp.  64-5. 

29  33-35.  The  lusty  i?ien,  etc.  Plutarch,  Laws  and  Customs  of  the 
LacedcE7nonians  (^Aforals  i.  90-91). 

30  7.   Olympus.    By  mistake  for  Olympia. 

30  7-8.  Three  fearful  felicities.  Cf.  Plutarch,  Alexander  3  :  "  Philip 
had  just  taken  the  city  of  Potidsea,  and  three  messengers  arrived  the 
same  day  with  extraordinary  tidings.  The  first  informed  him  that 
Parmenio  had  gained  a  great  battle  against  the  Illyrians;  the  second, 
that  his  racehorse  had  won  the  prize  at  the  Olympic  games;  and  the 
third,  that  Olympias  was  brought  to  bed  of  Alexander.  His  joy  on 
that  occasion  was  great,  as  might  naturally  be  expected;  and  the 
soothsayers  increased  it  by  assuring  him  that  his  son,  who  was  born  in 
the  midst  of  three  victories,  must  of  course  prove  invincible." 

30  16.  Turnus.  A  celebrated  character  in  the  last  half  of  the  ALneid. 
Cf.  note  on  24  20.  Tydeus.  See  Lliad,  Bk.  4.  Rinaldo.  See  Ariosto, 
Orlando  Furioso. 

30 20.  Plato.    Cf.  his  Phcedrus  250  (Jowett  2.  127);  "For  sight  is 


98 


NOTES. 


the  keenest  of  our  bodily  senses;  though  not  by  that  is  wisdom  seen; 
her  lovehness  would  have  been  transporting  if  there  had  been  a  visible 
image  of  her,  and  the  same  is  true  of  the  loveliness  of  the  other  ideas 
as  well." 

Tully.  Cf.  Cicero,  On  Duties  i.  5.  15  :  "  You  here  perceive  at  least  a 
sketch,  and,  as  it  were,  the  outline  of  virtue;  which,  could  we  perceive 
her  with  our  eyes,  would,  as  Plato  says,  kindle  a  wonderful  love  of 
wisdom."    Cf.  also  Sonnet  25  of  Astrophel  and  Stella  : 

The  wisest  scholar  of  the  wight  most  wise 
By  Phoebus*  doom,  with  sugared  sentence  says, 
That  virtue,  if  it  once  met  with  our  eyes, 
Strange  flames  of  love  it  in  our  souls  would  raise. 

"The  wight  most  wise  by  Phoebus'  doom"  is  of  course  Socrates.  Cf. 
43  23. 

30  26.  Sweet  poetry.    Cf.  44  23;  also  36  6,  41  8. 

3027.  Best.  Cf.  Dryden,  Discourse  on  Epic  Poetry  (near  the  be- 
ginning) :  "  An  heroic  poem  (truly  such)  is  undoubtedly  the  greatest 
work  which  the  soul  of  man  is  capable  to  perform.  The  design  of  it 
is  to  form  the  mind  to  heroic  virtue  by  example;  it  is  conveyed  in  verse 
that  it  may  delight  while  it  instructs." 

3110-11.  Melius  Chrysippo  et  Crantore.  Horace,  Epist.  I.  2.  4. 
The  opening  lines  are  (Howe's  translation)  : 

While  in  the  schools  of  Rome,  you,  Lollius!  plead, 

I  at  Praeneste  with  new  rapture  read 

The  tale  of  Troy  divine,  whose  facts  declare 

Where  moral  fitness  lies  —  expedience  where. 

Better  than  all  the  logic  of  the  sage, 

Than  Crantor's  precepts  or  Chrysippus'  page. 

Chrysippus  was  a  famous  Stoic  (282-209  B.C.).  Cf.  Cicero,  Character 
of  the  Orator  I.  II.  50:  "For  we  see  that  some  have  reasoned  on  the 
same  subjects  jejunely  and  dryly,  as  Chrysippus,  whom  they  celebrate 
as  the  acutest  of  philosophers;  nor  is  he  on  this  account  to  be  thought 
to  have  been  deficient  in  philosophy,  because  he  did  not  gain  the  talent 
of  speaking  from  an  art  which  is  foreign  to  philosophy." 

Of  Crantor  Cicero  says  {Tusc.  Disp.  3.  6.  12):  "Crantor,  who 
was  one  of  the  most  distinguished  men  that  our  academy  has  ever 
produced." 

31 12.  Poet-whippers.    Cf.  32  14. 

31 16.  Particularities.    Cf.  26 19  flf. 

3117.  Carping.    Cf.  32  17. 


NOTES, 


99 


31  19.  Ancient    Cf.  2  18-3  15. 

3121.  Learned.    Cf.  5  8-6  33.    Barbai'ous.    Cf.  4  21-5  7.  Sidney 
here  inverts  the  order,  as  indicated  in  the  note  on  11  2-3. 
31  23.  Prophesyifig.    Cf.  5  12-16. 
3124.  Making.    Cf.  6  28-33. 
31  27.  His  own  stuff.    Cf.  7  1-8  30. 
31  29.  Description.    Cf.  9  9  ff.    End.    13  1  ff. 
3131.   Goodness.    Cf.  26  3-11. 
31  32.  Chief.    Cf.  13  1-2. 
3133.   The  historian.    Cf.  22  7-10. 

31  34.   The  philosopher.    Cf.  22  14-23. 

32  1.  Holy  Scripture.    Cf.  9  17-26,  17  32  ff.,  25  27  ff. 
32  3.  Kinds.    Cf.  9  17  ff. 

32  4.  Dissections.    Cf.  11 1  ff.,  26  19  ff. 

32  14.  yii(joiji.Qv(joi.    Apparently  coined  by  Sidney. 

32 17.    Wandering.  Rambling. 

32  19.   Through-beholdiftg.    Cf.  18  3. 

32  20.  Those  kind.  Sidney  usually  employs  the  singular  demonstra- 
tive with  kind.    Thus  32  15,  33  8,  52  11-12. 

32  25.  The  discretion  of  an  ass.  Probably  in  allusion  to  the  I02d 
chapter  of  Agrippa's  work  (see  32  30,  below)  entitled  A  Digression  in 
Praise  of  the  Ass. 

32  26-27.  Comfortableness  .  .  .  plague.  Francesco  Berni,  an  Italian 
author  (ca.  1496-1535),  wrote  on  these  two  subjects,  debt  and  the 
plague.  Cf.  Symonds,  Renaissance  in  Italy  5,  364.  That  on  the  plague 
is  one  of  the  best  of  the  so-called  Capitoli,  in  which  such  subjects  were 
treated,  and  which  he  was  so  graceless  as  to  invent,  or  rather  revive. 
Such  themes  had  been  chosen  by  the  sophists  of  the  first  Christian 
centuries  as  a  means  of  exhibiting  their  intellectual  dexterity  and  rhe- 
torical skill,  but  it  was  reserved  for  Berni  and  his  imitators  to  add 
touches  of  bestial  obscenity  of  which  their  masters  were  incapable. 

32  29.  Another  instance  of  Sidney's  adaptation  of  the  Latin  authors 
to  his  purpose.    The  line  in  Ovid  stands  {Art  of  Love  2.  662)  : 

Ut  lateat  vitium  proximitate  boni, 

which  Sidney  might  have  expressed  by,  "  That  vice  lie  hid  in  nearness 
of  the  good." 

32  30.  Agrippa.  (Henry)  Cornelius  Agrippa,  a  German  scholar 
(1486-1535).  Emerson,  Essay  on  Books,  says:  "Cornelius  Agrippa 
*  On  the  Vanity  of  Arts  and  Sciences '  is  a  specimen  of  that  scribatious- 
ness  which  grew  to  be  the  habit  of  the  gluttonous  readers  of  his  time. 


100 


NOTES. 


.  .  .  They  read  voraciously,  and  must  disburden  themselves;  so  they 
take  any  general  topic,  as  Melancholy,  or  Praise  of  Science,  or  Praise 
of  Folly,  and  write  and  quote  without  method  or  end."  Agrippa's 
fourth  chapter  is  a  diatribe  against  poetry,  which  Harington  endeavors 
to  refute  (Haslewood,  2.  125  ff.). 

32  31.  Erasmus,  The  famous  Dutch  scholar  (1467-1536).  His 
Encomium  Morice,  or  Praise  of  Folly^  was  written  in  1509.  It  owes 
a  part  of  its  celebrity  to  the  illustrations  by  Holbein. 

33  5.  Scoffing  conieth  not  of  ivisdom,  Cf.  for  example,  Prov.  9.  8 : 
"  Reprove  not  a  scorner,  lest  he  hate  thee;  rebuke  a  wise  man,  and  he 
will  love  thee."  "  Bacon,  quoting  Prov.  14.  6  {Adv.  Learning  2.  21.  9), 
thus  comments  upon  it :  '  He  that  cometh  to  seek  after  knowledge 
with  a  mind  to  scorn  and  censure,  shall  be  sure  to  find  matter  for  his 
humor,  but  no  matter  for  his  instruction.' " 

33  15.  Scaliger.  The  second  book  of  his  Poetics  is  devoted  to  the 
Matter  of  Poetry,  as  he  calls  it,  under  which  head  he  treats  of  metrical 
feet. 

33  16.  Oratio,  etc.  Cf.  Cicero,  On  Duties  I.  16.  50:  "Of  this  (i.e. 
human  society)  the  bond  is  speech  and  reason  (oratio  et  ratio),  which 
by  teaching,  learning,  communicating,  debating,  and  judging,  conciliate 
men  together,  and  bind  them  into  a  kind  of  natural  society." 

34  7.   Throtighly.    Common  in  Shakespeare.    Cf.  Hml.  4.  5.  136. 

34 15.  PercontatorejTi,  etc.  Horace,  Epist.  I.  18.  69:  "Avoid  a 
curious  man;  he  is  sure  to  be  a  gossip."  Quoted  also  by  Bacon,  Adv. 
Learning  I.  4.  8,  and  by  him  translated,  "An  inquisitive  man  is  a 
prattler." 

34 16.  Dum  sibiy  etc.  Ovid,  Rem.  L.ove  686 :  "  While  each  one 
is  satisfying  himself,  we  are  ever  a  credulous  set." 

34  30.  Mother  of  lies.    But  cf.  38  27. 

34  32.  Siren's.  Cf.  Gosson,  p.  20 :  "  The  siren's  song  is  the  sailor's 
wrack." 

34  34.  To  ear.  To  plough.  Alluding  to  Chaucer,  Knighfs  Tale 
28: 

I  have,  God  woot,  a  large  feeld  to  ere. 

35 1.  Ln  other  nations.  Gosson,  p.  23,  illustrates  these  words: 
"  C.  Marius,  in  the  assembly  of  the  whole  Senate  at  Rome,  in  a  solemn 
oration  giveth  an  account  of  his  bringing  up :  he  showeth  that  he  hath 
been  taught  to  lie  on  the  ground,  to  suffer  all  weathers,  to  lead  men, 
to  strike  his  foe,  to  fear  nothing  but  an  evil  name."  For  this  oration 
cf.  Sallust,  Jugurtha  85. 


NOTES. 


101 


35  4.  Shady  idleness,    Cf.  Milton,  Lycidas  67-8  : 

Were  it  not  better  done,  as  others  use, 
To  sport  with  AmarylHs  in  the  shade? 

35  6.  Banished.  Gosson,  p.  20 :  "  No  marvel  though  Plato  shut 
them  out  of  his  school,  and  banished  them  quite  from  his  Common- 
wealth." Cf.  Milton,  Areopagitica  :  "Plato,  a  man  of  high  authority 
indeed,  but  least  of  all  for  his  Commonwealth,  in  the  book  of  his  Laws, 
which  no  city  ever  yet  received,  fed  his  fancy  with  making  many  edicts 
to  his  airy  burgomasters.  ...  By  which  laws  he  seems  to  tolerate  no 
kind  of  learning  but  by  unalterable  decree,  consisting  most  of  practical 
traditions,  to  the  attainment  whereof  a  library  of  smaller  bulk  than  his 
own  dialogues  would  be  abundant.  And  there  also  enacts,  that  no 
poet  should  so  much  as  read  to  any  private  man  what  he  had  written, 
until  the  judges  and  law-keepers  had  seen  it;  but  that  Plato  meant 
this  law  peculiarly  to  that  Commonwealth  which  he  had  imagined,  and 
to  no  other,  is  evident." 

35  11.  Peter e  principium.  Beg  the  question.  For  ify  etc.  Cf. 
13  1  ff.,  22  14  ff. 

35  20.   Out  of  earth.    Cf.  14  32. 

35  21.  Should  be.  Cf.  Abbott's  Shakespearian  Grafnmar,  §  328: 
'  Should,'  denoting  a  statement  not  made  by  the  speaker.  (Compare 

*  sollen  '  in  German.)  " 

35  24.   Though  he  would.    Cf.  Harington  (Haslewood,  2.  127): 

"But  poets  never  affirming  any  for  true,  but  presenting  them  to  us  as 

fables  and  imitations,  cannot  lie  though  they  would." 

35  28.  Physicians.    Cf.  38  IG. 

36  1.  Hardly  escape.  Cf.  36  23-24,  and  Agrippa,  Vanity  of  the  Arts 
and  Sciences^  ch.  6 :  "  Historians  are  at  such  variance  among  them- 
selves, delivering  several  tales  of  one  and  the  same  story,  that  it  is 
impossible  but  that  most  of  them  must  be  the  greatest  liars  in  the 
world !  " 

36  5.  Authorities.    Cf.  13  29. 

36  6.  Sweet  Muses.  Cf.  Scaliger,  Poetics  5.  b.  I  :  "  Hence  therefore 
the  poets  invoke  the  Muses,  that,  inspired  with  their  rage,  they  may 
complete  what  they  have  taken  in  hand." 

36  8.  Should.    Cf.  19  9,  36  21. 

36  11.  Nathan.    Cf.  25  27  ff. 

3616.  Avi07ig  the  beasts.    Cf.  18  18. 

36  18.  Upon  an  old  door.  Cf.  48  11-25,  and  Collier,  Hist.  Eng.  Dram. 
Poetry^  3.  375  :  "The  practice  of  exposing  to  the  eyes  of  the  audience 


102 


NOTES. 


in  the  opening  of  a  play  where  the  action  was  laid  continued  down  to 
the  time  of  Davenant,  and  it  is  remarkably  proved  by  the  very  first  piece 
in  which  scenery  was  employed.  ...  It  was  not  only  the  custom  to 
exhibit  to  the  eyes  of  the  audience  the  place  of  action,  but  the  title  of 
the  play;  one  of  the  oldest  instances  of  the  kind  is  to  be  found  in 
the  piece  last  quoted  (i.e.  Kyd's  Spanish  Tragedy)^  which  was  written 
about  1588." 

36  31.  John  of  the  Stile,  etc.  "Fictitious  characters  made  use  of 
by  lawyers  in  actions  of  ejectment."  Cf.  Wheeler's  Noted  N^ames  of 
Fiction. 

37  4.  Reverend.  Sidney,  like  Shakespeare,  employs  the  two  spell- 
ings, reverend  and  reverent.  I  have  normalized  to  the  first.  Cf.  57  12, 
and  the  variants. 

37  9.    Wanton  sinfulness.    Cf.  the  whole  of  Gosson's  pamphlet. 
37  10.  Abuse.   See  Sidney's  own  concessions,  45  20-27,  50  18  ff.,  51l9  ff. 
37 14.   Cupid.    Cf.  Harington  (Haslewood,  2.  134):  "  Sith  as  Sir 
Philip  Sidney  confesseth,  Cupido  is  crept  even  into  the  heroical  poems." 
3  7  24.  In  setting  forth,  etc.    Cf.  43  22-32. 
3  7  26.   Scurrility.    Cf.  50  18. 

3  7  30.  But  that,  etc.  Sidmey  and  Gosson,  by  their  mutual  conces- 
sions, approach  each  other  very  nearly  at  this  point.  See  Gosson, 
p.  40 ;  "  And  as  some  of  the  players  are  far  from  abuse,  so  some  of 
their  plays  are  without  rebuke;  which  are  as  easily  remembered  as 
quickly  reckoned."  And  again,  p.  65  :  "  He  that  readeth  with  advice 
the  books  which  I  wrote,  shall  perceive  that  I  touch  but  the  abuses  of 
all  these.  When  we  accuse  the  physician  for  killing  his  patient,  we 
find  no  fault  with  the  art  itself,  but  with  him  that  hath  abused  the 
same."  Cf.  Harington's  imitation  of  Sidney  (Haslewood, 2.  134)  :  "It 
may  be  said  where  any  scurrility  and  lewdness  is  found,  there  poetry 
doth  not  abuse  us,  but  writers  have  abused  poetry." 

37  32.  ElKadTLKT}.  The  distinction  here  made  is  from  Plato's  Sophist 
235-6  (Jowett  4.  448-9)  :  "  I  think  that  I  can  discern  two  divisions  of 
the  imitative  art,  but  I  am  not  as  yet  able  to  see  in  which  of  them  the 
desired  form  is  to  be  found. 

Thecetetus.  Will  you  tell  me  first  what  are  the  two  divisions  of 
which  you  are  speaking? 

Stranger.  One  is  the  art  of  likeness-making; — generally  a  like- 
ness is  made  by  producing  a  copy  which  is  executed  according  to  the 
proportions  of  the  original,  similar  in  length  and  breadth  and  depth, 
and  also  having  colors  answering  to  the  several  parts. 

Thecetetus.  But  is  not  this  always  the  case  in  imitation? 


NOTES. 


103 


Stranger.  Not  always;  in  works  either  of  sculpture  or  painting, 
which  are  of  any  magnitude,  there  is  a  certain  degree  of  deception; 
for  if  the  true  proportions  were  given,  the  upper  part,  which  is  farther 
off,  would  appear  to  be  out  of  proportion  in  comparison  with  the  lower, 
which  is  nearer;  and  so  our  artists  give  up  the  truth  in  their  images 
and  make  only  the  proportions  which  appear  to  be  beautiful,  disregard- 
ing the  real  ones."  The  first  answer  of  the  stranger  defines  clKaaTiKrjf 
the  second  (pavraariK'f). 

3  7  34.  ^aurao-TiK^,  Cf.  fantastically,  18  24,  and  the  last  note.  See 
also  Puttenham,  Bk.  I.  ch.  8 :  "  For  commonly  whoso  is  studious  in  the 
art,  or  shows  himself  excellent  in  it,  they  call  him  in  disdain  a  fantas- 
tical; and  a  light-headed  or  fantastical  man,  by  conversion,  they  call 
a  poet." 

38  10.  Army.    The  earliest  recorded  instance  of  this  figurative  use. 
38  12.    That  contrarizvise,  etc.    Cf.  Shak.,  Rom.  2.  3.  17-26: 

For  nought  so  vile  that  on  the  earth  doth  live 

But  to  the  earth  some  special  good  doth  give ; 

Nor  aught  so  good  but,  strained  from  that  fair  use, 

Revolts  from  true  birth,  stumbling  on  abuse. 

Virtue  itself  turns  vice,  being  misapplied, 

And  vice  sometime's  by  action  dignified. 

Within  the  infant  rind  of  this  small  flower 

Poison  hath  residence,  and  medicine  power; 

For  this,  being  smelt,  with  that  part  cheers  each  part, 

Being  tasted,  slays  all  senses  with  the  heart. 

38  27.  Fathers  of  lies.  Cf.  Gosson,  p.  21:  "  Tully  accustomed  to 
read  them  with  great  diligence  in  his  youth,  but,  when  he  waxed  graver 
in  study,  ...  he  accounted  them  the  fathers  of  lies."  See  also  Agrippa, 
Van.  of  Arts  and  Sciences,  ch.  4:  ''And  thus  the  best  and  wisest  of 
men  have  always  despised  poesy  as  the  parent  of  lies." 

38  30.  Our  nation.  Cf.  Gosson,  p.  34 :  "  Dion  saith  that  English- 
men could  suffer  watching  and  labor,  hunger  and  thirst,  and  bear  off 
all  storms  with  head  and  shoulders;  they  used  slender  weapons,  went 
naked,  and  were  good  soldiers;  they  fed  upon  roots  and  barks  of  trees, 
they  would  stand  up  to  the  chin  many  days  in  marshes  without  victuals, 
etc.  .  .  .  But  the  exercise  that  is  now  among  us  is  banqueting,  play- 
ing, piping,  and  dancing,  and  all  such  delights  as  may  win  us  to  pleasure 
or  rock  us  asleep." 

38  34.  No  memory,  etc.    Cf.  2  27  ff. 

39  1.    Yet  never.    Cf.  45  9. 

39  3.   Chain-shot.    The  earliest  example  of  the  word. 


104 


NOTES, 


39  4.  Bookishness.  No  earlier  appearance  of  this  word  has  been 
noted. 

39  5.  Certain  Goths.  The  story  is  related  by  Gibbon,  ch.  lo :  "  We 
are  told  that  in  the  sack  of  Athens  the  Goths  had  collected  all  the 
libraries,  and  were  on  the  point  of  setting  fire  to  this  funeral  pile  of 
Grecian  learning,  had  not  one  of  their  chiefs,  of  more  refined  policy 
than  his  brethren,  dissuaded  them  from  the  design  by  the  profound 
observation,  that  as  long  as  the  Greeks  were  addicted  to  the  study  of 
books  they  would  never  apply  themselves  to  the  exercise  of  arms.  The 
sagacious  counsellor  (should  the  truth  of  the  fact  be  admitted)  reasoned 
like  an  ignorant  barbarian.  In  the  most  polite  and  powerful  nations, 
genius  of  every  kind  has  displayed  itself  about  the  same  period,  and 
the  age  of  science  has  generally  been  the  age  of  military  virtue  and  suc- 
cess." Gibbon  derives  it  from  Zonaras  (l2.  635),  a  mediaeval  Byzantine 
compiler  (1081-1 118  A.D.),  who  in  turn  transcribes,  with  slight  changes, 
an  anonymous  continuer  of  the  Ro7iian  History  of  Dio  Cassius,  perhaps 
of  the  age  of  Constantine.  There  were  French  (1561)  and  Italian 
(1564)  translations  of  Zonaras  which  Sidney  might  have  read,  or  he 
might  have  seen  the  account  in  Montaigne  (1580),  Bk.  1.  ch.  24.  An 
interesting  parallel  is  furnished  by  Florio's  translation  of  this  chapter  of 
Montaigne.  Dio  (54.  17)  tells  of  a  similar  reply  made  by  the  actor 
Pylades  to  Augustus. 

39  20.  Horace.  The  line  is  adapted  from  Horace,  Sat.  i.  i.  63: 
"Jubeas  miserum  esse  libenter  Cheerfully  bid  him  go  and  be 

wretched,"  as  the  line  was  then  interpreted.  Sidney  accordingly  means : 
**I  cheerfully  bid  him  be  a  fool." 

39  24.    Companion  of  tJie  camps.    Cf.  45  10. 

39  26.    Quiddity y  Qic.    Philosophical  terms. 

39  28.   Turks.    Cf.  4  21. 

39  33.  First  light.    Cf.  2  29. 

40  2.  Fortune.  Cf.  Plutarch,  Fortune  or  Virtue  of  Alexander  (^Mor- 
als I.  505):  "To  which  grandeur  if  he  arrived  by  the  assistance  of 
Fortune,  he  is  to  be  acknowledged  the  greater,  because  he  made  so 
glorious  a  use  of  her.  So  that  the  more  any  man  extols  his  fortune, 
the  more  he  advances  his  virtue,  which  made  him  worthy  of  such 
fortune." 

40  3.  Did  not.    Had  not. 

40  4.  Left  his  schoolmaster.  Plutarch,  Alexander  7,  speaks  of  Alex- 
ander's writing  to  Aristotle  from  Asia. 

40  5.  Took  dead  Homer.  Plutarch,  Alexander  8:  "The  Iliad  he 
thought,  as  well  as  called,  a  portable  treasure  of  military  knowledge; 


NOTES, 


105 


and  he  had  a  copy  corrected  by  Aristotle,  which  is  called  *  the  casket 
copy.'  Onesicritus  informs  us  that  he  used  to  lay  it  under  his  pillow 
with  his  sword." 

40  6.  Callisthenes.  Cf.  Plutarch's  account  in  his  Alexander^  53,  55  : 
"  His  great  reputation  naturally  exposed  him  to  envy;  and  he  gave  some 
room  for  calumny  himself,  by  often  refusing  the  king's  invitations,  and 
when  he  did  go  to  his  entertainments,  by  sitting  solemn  and  silent; 
which  showed  that  he  could  neither  commend,  nor  was  satisfied  with 
what  passed.  .  .  .  His  death  is  variously  related.  Some  say  Alexander 
ordered  him  to  be  hanged;  others,  that  he  fell  sick  and  died  in  chains," 
etc. 

40  9.  Ho77ier  had  been  alive.  Probably  referring  to  Cicero's  state- 
ment, Archias  10.  24:  "How  many  historians  of  his  exploits  is  Alex- 
ander the  Great  said  to  have  had  with  him !  and  he,  when  standing  on 
Cape  Sigeum  at  the  grave  of  Achilles,  said,  *  O  happy  youth,  to  find 
Homer  as  the  panegyrist  of  your  glory ! '  And  he  said  the  truth,  for 
if  the  Iliad  had  not  existed,  the  same  tomb  which  covered  his  body 
would  also  have  buried  his  renown."  A  similar  account  of  this  incident 
is  given  by  Plutarch,  Alexander  15. 

40  12.  If  Cato  misliked  Fulvitis.  Referring  to  Gosson,  p.  21  :  "  Cato 
layeth  it  in  the  dish  of  Marcus  the  noble  as  a  foul  reproach,  that  in  the 
time  of  his  consulship  he  brought  Ennius  the  poet  into  his  province." 
Cf.  also  Agrippa,  Van.  of  Arts  and  Sciences,  ch.  4:  "And  Q.  Fulvius 
was  accused  by  M.  Cato,  for  that  he,  going  proconsul  into  Asia,  had 
taken  Ennius  the  poet  along  with  him  to  bear  him  company."  These 
statements  are  based  upon  Cicero,  Tusc.  Disp.  i,  2.  3:  "A  speech  of 
Cato's  shows  this  kind  of  poetry  to  have  been  in  no  great  esteem,  as 
he  censures  Marcus  Nobilior  (i.e.  Fulvius)  for  carrying  poets  with  him 
into  his  province;  for  that  consul,  as  we  know,  carried  Ennius  with  him 
into  ^Etolia." 

40 14.  Fulvius  liked  it.  Cf.  Cicero,  Archias  11.  27:  "And  lately 
that  great  man  Fulvius,  who  fought  with  the  yEtolians,  having  Ennius 
for  his  companion,  did  not  hesitate  to  devote  the  spoils  of  Mars  to  the 
Muses." 

40  15.  Excellent  Cato  Uticensis.  Great-grandson  of  Cato  the  Censor 
(95-46  B.C.).  For  his  excellence  cf.  Sallust,  Catiline  54:  "Cato  .  .  . 
made  temperance,  dignity,  and,  above  all,  austerity  of  behavior,  his 
pursuit.  He  did  not  vie  in  wealth  with  the  wealthy,  nor  in  intrigue 
with  the  intriguer,  but  in  courage  with  the  man  of  action,  in  honor 
with  the  scrupulous,  in  self-restraint  with  the  upright.  He  preferred 
to  be  good  rather  than  to  seem  so;  and  thus,  the  less  he  pursued 


106 


NOTES. 


renown,  the  more  it  attended  him.''  And  see,  besides  Plutarch,  Cato 
ihe  Younger,  Longfellow,  Translation  of  Dante,  note  on  Purg.  i.  31  : 
"  Here,  on  the  shores  of  Purgatory,  his  countenance  is  adorned  with 
the  light  of  the  four  stars,  which  are  the  four  virtues.  Justice,  Prudence, 
Fortitude,  and  Temperance,  and  it  is  foretold  of  him  that  his  garments 
will  shine  brightly  on  the  last  day.  And  here  he  is  the  symbol  of 
Liberty,  since  for  her  sake  to  him  *  not  bitter  was  death  in  Utica ' ; 
and  the  meaning  of  Purgatory  is  spiritual  Liberty,  or  freedom  from  sin 
through  purification,  *  the  glorious  liberty  of  the  children  of  God.'  " 

40  19.  Misliked,  etc.  Cf.  Plutarch,  Cato  the  Censor  22,  23  :  "  When 
Cato  was  very  far  advanced  in  years,  there  arrived  in  Rome  two  ambas- 
sadors from  Athens,  Carneades  the  Academic,  and  Diogenes  the  Stoic. 
.  .  .  Upon  the  arrival  of  these  philosophers,  such  of  the  Roman  youth 
as  had  a  taste  for  learning  went  to  wait  on  them,  and  heard  them  with 
wonder  and  delight.  .  .  .  But  Cato,  from  the  beginning,  was  alarmed 
at  it.  He  no  sooner  perceived  this  passion  for  the  Grecian  learning 
prevail,  but  he  was  afraid  that  the  youth  would  turn  their  ambition  that 
way,  and  prefer  the  glory  of  eloquence  to  that  of  deeds  of  arms.  .  .  . 
And  to  dissuade  his  son  from  those  studies,  he  told  him  in  a  louder 
tone  than  could  be  expected  from  a  man  of  his  age,  and,  as  it  were,  in 
an  oracular  and  prophetic  way,  that  when  the  Romans  came  thoroughly 
to  imbibe  the  Grecian  literature,  they  would  lose  the  empire  of  the 
world.  But  time  has  shown  the  vanity  of  that  invidious  assertion;  for 
Rome  was  never  at  a  higher  pitch  of  greatness  than  when  she  was 
most  perfect  in  the  Grecian  erudition,  and  most  attentive  to  all  manner 
of  learning."    Milton  relates  the  same  story  in  his  Areopagitica. 

40  20.  Fourscore  years  old.  Bacon,  Adv.  Learning  i.  2.  9,  says 
threescore :  As  to  the  judgment  of  Cato  the  Censor,  he  was  well 
punished  for  his  blasphemy  against  learning,  in  the  same  kind  wherein 
he  offended;  for  when  he  was  past  threescore  years  old  he  was  taken 
with  an  extreme  desire  to  go  to  school  again,  and  to  learn  the  Greek 
tongue  to  the  end  to  peruse  the  Greek  authors,  which  doth  well  dem- 
onstrate that  his  former  censure  of  the  Grecian  learning  was  rather  an 
affected  gravity  than  according  to  the  inward  sense  of  his  own  opinion." 
But  cf.  the  words  put  in  his  mouth  by  Cicero,  Old  Age  8.  26 :  "  Nay, 
they  even  learn  something  new;  as  we  see  Solon  in  his  verses  boasting, 
who  says  that  he  was  becoming  an  old  man,  daily  learning  something 
new,  as  I  have  done,  who,  when  an  old  man,  learned  the  Greek 
language;  which  too  I  so  greedily  grasped,  as  if  I  were  desirous  of 
satisfying  a  long  protracted  thirst."  Reid  and  Kelsey,  in  their  edition 
of  the  Cato  Maior  (Boston,  1885)  say,  p.  xx:  "The  ancients  give  us 


NOTES. 


107 


merely  statements  that  he  only  began  to  learn  Greek  '  in  his  old 
age.'  " 

40  21.  Belike.    Cf.  41  35. 

40  25.  Scipio  Nasica.  The  Roman  Senate,  being  charged  by  the 
Delphic  oracle  to  select  the  best  man  of  Rome  to  bring  the  statue  of 
the  Idsean  mother  from  Pessinus  to  Rome,  in  204  B.C.  made  their 
decision,  and  the  choice  fell  upon  Scipio  Nasica.  Cf.  Livy  29.  14: 
"  Publius  Scipio,  son  of  Cneius  who  had  fallen  in  Spain,  a  youth  not 
yet  of  the  age  to  be  quaestor,  they  adjudged  to  be  the  best  of  the  good 
men  in  the  whole  state."  See  Mayor's  edition  of  Juvenal,  note  on 
3.  137.  An  anecdote  illustrating  the  intimacy  of  Scipio  with  Ennius 
is  found  in  Cicero,  Cha^'acter  of  the  Oi'ator  2.  68.  276. 

40  30.  Sepulchre.  See  Cicero,  Archias  9.  22:  "Our  countryman, 
Ennius,  was  dear  to  the  elder  Africanus;  and  even  on  the  tomb  of  the 
Scipios  his  effigy  is  believed  to  be  visible,  carved  in  the  marble." 

412.  Most  poetical.  Cf.  notes  on  3  18  and  3  27,  and  Jowett,  Plato 
3.  139  :  "  Why  Plato,  who  was  himself  a  poet,  and  whose  dialogues  are 
poems  and  dramas,  should  have  been  hostile  to  the  poets  as  a  class, 
and  especially  to  the  dramatic  poets.  .  .  ." 

Fountain.    Cf.  44  13. 

41  6.  Natural  enemy.  Cf.  Plato,  Republic  10.  607  (Jowett  3.  504)  : 
"  Let  this  then  be  our  excuse  for  expelling  poetry,  that  the  argument 
constrained  us;  but  let  us  also  make  an  apology  to  her,  lest  she  impute 
to  us  any  harshness  or  want  of  politeness.  We  will  tell  her  that  there 
is  an  ancient  quarrel  between  philosophy  and  poetry.  .  .  ." 

41 14.  Force  of  delight.    Cf.  24  22. 

41  20.  Had  their  lives  saved.  Cf.  Plutarch,  Nicias  29  :  "  Some  there 
were  who  owed  their  preservation  to  Euripides.  Of  all  the  Grecians, 
his  was  the  muse  whom  the  Sicilians  were  most  in  love  with.  From 
every  stranger  that  landed  in  their  island  they  gleaned  every  small 
specimen  or  portion  of  his  works,  and  communicated  it  with  pleasure 
to  each  other.  It  is  said  that  on  this  occasion  a  number  of  Athenians, 
upon  their  return  home,  went  to  Euripides,  and  thanked  him  in  the 
most  respectful  manner  for  their  obligations  to  his  pen;  some  having 
been  enfranchised  for  teaching  their  masters  what  they  remembered 
of  his  poems,  and  others  having  got  refreshments  when  they  were 
wandering  about  after  the  battle,  for  singing  a  few  of  his  verses.  Nor 
is  this  to  be  wondered  at,  since  they  tell  us  that  when  a  ship  from 
Caunus,  which  happened  to  be  pursued  by  pirates,  was  going  to  take 
shelter  in  one  of  their  ports,  the  Sicilians  at  first  refused  to  admit  her; 
upon  asking  the  crew  whether  they  knew  any  of  the  verses  of  Euripides, 


108 


NOTES. 


and  being  answered  in  the  affirmative,  they  received  both  them  and  their 
vessel."    See  also  the  Prologue  of  Browning's  Balaustion's  Adventure. 

41  23.  Su?ionides.  A  contemporary  and  rival  of  Pindar  (556-468 
B.C.).  He  resided  for  some  time  at  the  court  of  King  Pliero  in  Sicily, 
and  in  the  year  476  B.C.  was  instrumental  in  effecting  a  reconciliation 
between  him  and  Theron.  In  his  dialogue  entitled  Hiero,  Xenophon 
introduces  him  as  discussing  with  that  monarch  the  advantages  and 
disadvantages  of  kingly  station. 

Pindar.  In  472  he  visited  the  court  of  Hiero,  but  the  length  of  his 
stay  is  uncertain.  The  indirect  manner  in  which  he  imparted  moral 
counsels  to  the  tyrant  is  illustrated  in  his  Third  Pythian  Ode,  68-71  : 
"  And  then  in  a  ship  would  I  have  sailed,  cleaving  the  Ionian  sea,  to 
the  fountain  of  Arethusa,  to  the  home  of  my  Aitnaian  [^tnsean]  friend, 
who  ruleth  at  Syracuse,  a  king  of  good  will  to  the  citizens,  not  envious 
of  the  good,  to  strangers  wondrous  fatherly." 

41  26.  Was  made  a  slave.  Cf.  Mahaffy,  Hist.  Grk.  Lit.  2.  161  :  "He 
gained  his  first  practical  experience  of  the  effects  of  irresponsible  mon- 
archy from  the  elder  Dionysius.  Though  introduced  by  Dion,  the 
tyrant  was  so  offended  with  his  views,  which  were  then  probably  a 
reflex  of  those  of  Socrates,  that  he  delivered  him  up  to  the  Spartan 
ambassador  PoUis,  who  had  him  sold  in  the  market  of  y^gina."  See 
also  Cicero,  Fab.  Postumus  9.  23 :  "  We  have  heard  that  that  great 
man,  beyond  all  comparison  the  most  learned  man  that  all  Greece  ever 
produced,  Plato,  was  in  the  greatest  danger,  and  was  exposed  to  the 
most  treacherous  designs  by  the  wickedness  of  Dionysius,  the  tyrant  of 
Sicily,  to  whom  he  had  trusted  himself.  We  know  that  Callisthenes, 
a  very  learned  man,  the  companion  of  Alexander  the  Great,  was  slain 
by  Alexander." 

41  29.  One  should  do.  Evidently  referring  to  Scaliger,  Poetics  5.  b.  i : 
"  Let  him  look  to  see  what  foolish  and  filthy  tales  he  introduces,  and 
what  opinions  reeking  with  the  vice  which  above  all  others  is  peculiar 
to  Greece  he  ever  and  anon  expresses.  Certainly  it  were  worth  while 
never  to  have  read  Phsedrus  or  the  Symposium,  and  other  monstrous 
works  of  this  nature." 

41  35.  Community  of  women.  Cf.  the  admirable  discussion  by  Jowett, 
in  his  translation  of  Plato,  of  which  I  cite  a  mere  fragment  (3.  167)  : 
"  What  Plato  had  heard  or  seen  of  Sparta  was  applied  by  him  in  a 
mistaken  way  to  his  ideal  commonwealth.  He  probably  observed 
that  both  the  Spartan  men  and  women  were  superior  in  form  and 
strength  to  the  other  Greeks;  and  this  superiority  he  was  disposed  to 
attribute  to  the  laws  and  customs  relating  to  marriage." 


NOTES. 


109 


42  7.  Twice  two  poets.  These  are  Aratus,  Cleanthes,  Epimenides, 
and  Menander.  The  first  two  are  quoted  in  Acts  17.  28,  the  third 
Titus  I.  12,  and  the  fourth  l  Cor.  15.  33.  The  verse,  "  For  in  him  we 
live,  and  move,  and  have  our  being,"  is  found  substantially  in  the 
Phoenomena  (cf.  note  on  44.  25)  of  Aratus,  who  lived  in  the  third  cen- 
tury B.C.,  and  in  the  Hymn  to  Zeus  of  Cleanthes,  whose  lifetime  fell 
somewhat  later  in  the  same  century.  Epimenides  of  Crete  lived  much 
earlier,  in  the  sixth  century  B.C.  It  is  to  him  that  Paul  is  said  by 
Chrysostom  and  others  to  refer  in  Titus  I.  12:  "One  of  themselves,  a 
prophet  of  their  own,  said,  Cretans  are  always  liars,  evil  beasts,  idle 
gluttons."  The  quotation,  which  forms  a  complete  hexameter  in  the 
original,  is  said  by  the  early  commentators  to  have  been  taken  from 
his  poem  On  Oracles,  which  has  long  since  perished.  The  gnomic 
sentence,  "Evil  company  doth  corrupt  good  manners,"  I  Cor.  15.  33, 
is  from  the  Thais  of  the  comic  dramatist  Menander  (342-291  B.C.). 

42  8.  Watchivord  upon  philosophy.  Cf.  Col.  2.8:  "  Take  heed  lest 
there  shall  be  any  one  that  maketh  spoil  of  you  through  his  philosophy 
and  vain  deceit." 

42  10.  Not  upon  poetry.  Cf.  Scaliger,  Poetics  5.  a.  i:  "And  if  he 
condemns  some  of  their  books,  we  are  not  for  that  reason  to  be  deprived 
of  the  rest,  such  as  he  himself  frequently  employs  to  confirm  the 
authority  of  his  arguments." 

4213.  Would  not  have,  etc.  Cf.  Plato,  Republic  3.  391  (Jowett 
3.  265)  :  "  We  will  not  have  them  teaching  our  youth  that  the  gods  are 
the  authors  of  evil,  and  that  heroes  are  no  better  than  men;  undoubt- 
edly these  sentiments,  as  we  were  saying,  are  neither  pious  nor  true, 
for  they  are  at  variance  with  our  demonstration  that  evil  cannot  come 
from  God.  .  .  .  And  further  they  are  likely  to  have  a  bad  effect  on 
those  who  hear  them.  .  .  .  And  therefore  let  us  put  an  end  to  such 
tales,  lest  they  engender  laxity  of  morals  among  the  young." 

42  20.  Imitation.    Cf.  9  12. 

42  27.  Atheisffi.    The  first  example  of  the  word. 

42  29.  Meant  not  in  general.  Cf.  Jowett,  Plato  3.  146  :  "  Plato  does 
not  seriously  intend  to  expel  poetry  from  human  life.  But  he  feels 
strongly  the  ul^|^eality  of  poets;  and  he  is  protesting  against  the  degen- 
eracy of  them  in  his  own  day  as  we  might  protest  against  the  want  of 
serious  purpose  in  modern  poetry,  against  the  unseemliness  or  extrava- 
gance of  some  of  our  novelists,  against  the  time-serving  of  preachers 
or  public  writers,  against  the  regardlessness  of  truth,  which  to  the  eye 
of  the  philosopher  seems  to  characterize  the  greater  part  of  the  world. 
.  .  .    For  there  might  be  a  poetry  which  would  be  the  hymn  of  divine 


110 


NOTES. 


perfection,  the  harmony  of  justice  and  truth  among  men :  a  strain  which 
should  renew  the  youth  of  the  world,  as  in  primitive  ages  the  poet  was 
men's  only  teacher  and  best  friend :  which  would  hnd  materials  in  the 
living  present  as  well  as  in  the  romance  of  the  past,  and  might  subdue 
to  the  fairest  forms  of  speech  and  verse  the  intractable  materials  of 
modern  civilization:  which  might  elicit  the  simple  principles,  or,  as 
Plato  would  have  called  them,  the  essential  forms  of  truth  and  good- 
ness out  of  the  variety  of  opinion  and  the  complexity  of  modern  society: 
which  would  preserve  all  the  good  of  each  generation  and  leave  the 
bad  unsung:  which  should  be  based  not  on  vain  longings  or  faint 
imaginings,  but  on  a  clear  insight  into  the  nature  of  man.  Then  the 
tale  of  love  might  begin  again  in  poetry  or  prose,  two  in  one,  united  in 
the  pursuit  of  knowledge,  or  the  service  of  God  and  man;  and  feelings 
of  love  might  still  be  the  incentive  to  great  thoughts  and  heroic  deeds 
as  in  the  days  of  Dante  or  Petrarch;  and  many  types  of  manly  and 
womanly  beauty  might  appear  among  us,  rising  above  the  ordinary  level 
of  humanity,  and  many  lives  which  were  like  poems  be  not  only  written 
but  lived  among  us." 

42  31.  Qua  autJioritate ^  etc.  Scaliger,  Poetics  5.  a.  I:  "Which 
authority  (i.e.  that  of  Plato)  certain  rude  and  barbarous  persons  desire 
to  abuse,  in  order  to  banish  poets  out  of  the  commonwealth." 

43  13.  Inspiring.  Cf.  Plato,  Ion  534  (Jowett  i.  248)  :  "  For  the  poet 
is  a  light  and  winged  and  holy  thing,  and  there  is  no  invention  in  him 
until  he  has  been  inspired  and  out  of  his  senses,  and  the  mind  is  no 
longer  in  him :  when  he  has  not  attained  to  this  state,  he  is  powerless 
and  is  unable  to  utter  his  oracles.  .  .  .  And  therefore  God  takes  away 
the  minds  of  poets,  and  uses  them  as  his  ministers,  as  he  also  uses 
diviners  and  holy  prophets,  in  order  that  we  who  hear  them  may  know 
that  they  speak  not  of  themselves  who  utter  these  priceless  words  in  a 
state  of  unconsciousness,  but  that  God  is  the  speaker,  and  that  through 
them  he  is  conversing  with  us."  See  also  5  7  23,  and  cf.  Spenser,  Shep- 
herd^ s  Calendar y  October^  Argument :  "  In  Cuddie  is  set  out  the  perfect 
pattern  of  a  poet,  which,  finding  no  maintenance  of  his  state  and 
studies,  complaineth  of  the  contempt  of  poetry,  and  the  causes  thereof; 
specially  having  been  in  all  ages,  and  even  amongst  the  most  barbarous, 
always  of  singular  account  and  honor,  and  being,  indeed,  so  worthy 
and  commendable  an  art;  or  rather  no  art,  but  a  Divine  gift  and  heav- 
enly instinct  not  to  be  gotten  by  labor  and  learning,  but  adorned  with 
both,  and  poured  into  the  wit  by  a  certain  ivOova-iaafihs  and  celestial 
inspiration,  as  the  author  hereof  elsewhere  at  large  discourseth  in  his 
book  called  '  The  English  Poet,'  which  book  being  lately  come  to 


NOTES. 


Ill 


my  hands,  I  mind  also,  by  God's  grace,  upon  further  advisement, 
to  publish." 

43  18.  Sea  of  examples,  Cf.  Shak.  Hml.  3.  i.  59  :  "  Sea  of  troubles." 
Alejcande7^s.  Cf  40  4  ff.,  and  Harington  (Haslewood,  2.  122):  "For 
who  would  once  dare  to  oppose  himself  against  so  many  Alexanders, 
Caesars,  Scipios,  .  .  .  that  .  .  .  have  encouraged  and  advanced  poets 
and  poetry?  " 

43  19.  Scipios.    Cf.  40  25  ff. 

43  20.  Roman  Socrates.  Cf.  Cicero,  On  Duties  I.  26.  90:  "That 
equanimity  in  every  condition  of  life  is  a  noble  attribute,  and  that 
uniform  expression  of  countenance  and  appearance  which  we  find 
recorded  of  Socrates,  and  also  of  Caius  Lgelius." 

43  22.  Made  by  him.  Cf.  Cicero,  To  Atticus  7.  3.  10 :  "The  come- 
dies of  Terence  are  thought,  on  account  of  their  elegance  of  diction, 
to  have  been  written  by  C.  Laelius."  Terence  himself,  in  the  prologue 
to  the  HeautontimoroumenoSy  says :  "  Then,  as  to  a  malevolent  old 
poet  saymg  that  he  (i.e.  Terence)  has  suddenly  applied  himself  to 
dramatic  pursuits,  relying  on  the  genius  of  his  friends,  and  not  his  own 
natural  abilities;  on  that  your  judgment,  your  opinion,  will  prevail." 
The  reference  to  Lselius  is  thought  to  be  still  more  explicit  in  the 
prologue  to  the  Adelphi. 

43  23.  Only  wise  man.  Cf.  Plato,  Apology  21  (Jowett  I.  353): 
"  He  (i.e.  Chserephon)  went  to  Delphi  and  boldly  asked  the  oracle  to 
tell  him  whether  .  .  .  there  was  any  one  wiser  than  I  was,  and  the 
Pythian  prophetess  answered,  that  there  was  no  man  wiser." 

43  24.  ^sofs  Fables.  Cf.  Plato,  Fhcsdo  60-61  (Jowett  i.  432-3), 
where  Socrates  says :  "  In  the  course  of  my  life  I  have  often  had  inti- 
mations in  dreams  '  that  I  should  compose  music'  The  same  dream 
came  to  me  sometimes  in  one  form,  and  sometimes  in  another,  but 
always  saying  the  same  or  nearly  the  same  words :  Compose  and  prac- 
tise music,  said  the  dream.  And  hitherto  I  had  imagined  that  this  was 
only  intended  to  exhort  and  encourage  me  in  the  study  of  philosophy, 
which  has  always  been  the  pursuit  of  my  life,  and  is  the  noblest  and 
best  of  music.  The  dream  was  bidding  me  do  what  I  was  already 
doing,  in  the  same  way  that  the  competitor  in  a  race  is  bidden  by  the 
spectators  to  run  when  he  is  already  running.  But  I  was  not  certain 
of  this,  as  the  dream  might  have  meant  music  in  the  popular  sense  of 
the  word,  and  being  under  sentenx:e  of  death,  and  the  festival  giving 
me  a  respite,  I  thought  that  I  should  be  safer  if  I  satisfied  the  scruple, 
and,  in  obedience  to  the  dream,  composed  a  few  verses  before  I  de- 
parted.   And  first  I  made  a  hymn  in  honor  of  the  god  of  the  festival, 


112 


NOTES, 


and  then  considering  that  a  poet,  if  he  is  really  to  be  a  poet,  should  not 
only  put  together  words,  but  should  invent  stories,  and  that  I  have  no 
invention,  I  took  some  fables  of  ^Esop,  which  1  had  ready  at  hand  and 
knew,  and  turned  them  into  verse." 

43  29.  Teacheth  the  use.  In  his  On  Listening  to  Poetry  (^Morals 
2.  42-94). 

43  32.  Guards  of  poesy.  Guard  =  ornamental  border,  ornament. 
Cf.  Shak.  Ado  i.  i.  288-9:  "The  body  of  your  discourse  is  sometime 
guarded  with  fragments,  and  the  guards  are  but  slightly  basted  on." 
Plutarch  is  very  fond  of  poetical  quotation. 

44  4.  Low-creeping.  Perhaps  with  reference  to  Horace's  "  serpit 
humi,"  Art  of  Poetry  28.    Cf.  earth-creeping^  58  5,  and  note  on  55  25. 

44  5.  Not  being  an  art  of  lies.    Cf.  35  21-37  7. 
44  6.  Not  of  effeminateness.    Cf.  38  29-40  32. 
44  7.  Not  of  abusing.    Cf.  3  7  8-38  28. 
44  8.  Not  banished.    Cf.  42  9-43  15. 

44  9.  Engarland.  Used  by  Sidney  in  Sonnet  56  of  Astrophel  and 
Stella. 

44  22.  Musa,  etc.  Virgil,  ^neid  i.  12:  "O  Muse,  relate  to  me  the 
causes,  tell  me  in  what  had  her  will  been  offended?  " 

44  25.  David.  Cf.  6  5,  9 19.  Adrian.  Roman  emperor  (76-138 
A.D.).  See  Capes,  Age  of  the  Antojiijies^  p.  54:  "  Poet,  geometer,  musi- 
cian, orator,  and  artist,  he  had  studied  all  the  graces  and  accomplish- 
ments of  liberal  culture,  knew  something  of  the  history  and  genius  of 
every  people,  could  estimate  their  literary  or  artistic  skill,  and  admire 
the  achievements  of  the  past."  And  again,  pp.  69-70 :  "  Even  on  his 
deathbed  he  could  feel  the  poet's  love  for  tuneful  phrase,  and  the 
verses  are  still  left  to  us  which  were  addressed  by  him  to  his  soul, 
which,  pale  and  cold  and  naked,  would  soon  have  to  make  its  way  to 
regions  all  unknown,  with  none  of  its  whilom  gaiety : 

Animula,  vagula,  blandula, 
Hospes  comesque  corporis, 
Quae  nunc  abibis  in  loca. 
Pallidula,  rigida,  nudula, 
Nec  ut  soles  dabis  jocos." 

These  lines  have  been  translated  by  Byron,  and  loosely  paraphrased  by 
Pope,  with  the  admixture  of  Christian  sentiment. 

Sophocles.  The  Greek  tragic  poet  (496-406  B.C.).  Probably  placed 
here  because  of  the  commands  with  which  his  fellow-citizens  entrusted 
him.    Cf.  Mahaffy,  Hist.  Grk.  Lit.  I.  280-1:  "The  Athenian  public 


NOTES. 


113 


were  so  delighted  with  his  Antigone  that  they  appointed  him  one  of 
the  ten  generals,  along  with  Pericles,  for  the  subduing  of  Samos  .  .  . 
He  was  (in  443  B.C.)  one  of  the  Hellenotamice^  or  administrators  of  the 
public  treasury  —  a  most  responsible  and  important  post.  He  sided 
with  the  oligarchy  in  411,  if  he  be  the  Probulus  (i.e.  member  of  the 
council)  then  mentioned." 

Germanicus,  The  nephew  and  adopted  son  of  the  emperor  Tiberius, 
and  commander  of  an  expedition  against  the  Germans  (15  B.C.-19  A.D.). 
Besides  more  original  poems,  he  composed  a  translation  of  the  Phce- 
nomena^  a  didactic  poem  by  the  Greek  poet  Aratus.  Cruttwell,  Hist. 
Rom.  Lit.  p.  349,  calls  it  "  elegant  and  faithful,  and  superior  to  Cicero's 
in  poetical  inspiration." 

44  27.  Robe7't,  King  of  Sicily.  Robert  II.  of  Anjou  (i  275-1343 
A.D.).  Of  him  we  are  told  by  Paulus  Jovius,  Elogia  (Basle,  1575)  : 
"  He  bore  with  marvellous  fortitude  the  death  of  his  only  son,  con- 
soling himself  with  .  .  .  the  best  literature,  in  which  he  became  so 
proficient  that  he  was  wont  to  say  that  he  preferred  it  to  the  possession 
of  his  kingdom.  He  was  a  munificent  patron  to  the  professors  of  the 
highest  learning,  and  took  so  much  pleasure  in  light  and  graceful 
poetry  that  he  was  desirous,  in  addition  to  the  many  other  marks  of 
his  favor  which  he  had  previously  bestowed  upon  Francis  Petrarch,  to 
confer  upon  him  with  his  own  hands  the  honor  of  the  laureateship,  the 
same  which  Petrarch  preferred  afterwards  to  receive  at  the  Capitol 
in  Rome."  Cf.  Symonds,  Renaissance  in  Italy  2.  252:  "Robert  of 
Anjou  was  proud  to  call  himself  the  friend  of  Petrarch,  and  Boccaccio 
found  the  flame  of  inspiration  at  his  court." 

44  28.  Francis  of  France.  The  critic  Sainte  Beuve  says  of  him : 
"  Fascinated  by  every  species  of  noble  culture  of  the  arts  and  the  intel- 
lect; admiring  and  appreciating  Erasmus  as  well  as  Lionardo  da  Vinci 
and  Primaticcio,  and  bent,  as  he  himself  was  accustomed  to  avow,  upon 
adorning  with  them  his  nation  and  his  kingdom;  a  fosterer  of  the  ver- 
nacular, by  employing  it  in  documents  of  state;  and  the  founder  of 
free  higher  education  outside  of  the  Sorbonne;  he  justifies,  in  spite 
of  many  errors  and  vagaries,  the  title  awarded  him  by  the  gratitude  of 
his  contemporaries.  The  service  he  rendered  consists  less  in  this  or 
that  particular  institution  of  his  creation  than  in  the  spirit  with  which 
he  was  animated  and  which  communicated  itself  to  every  one  about 
him." 

King  James  of  Scotland.  Probably  James  1.  (i 394-1437),  author 
of  The  King's  Quair,  the  poetical  disciple  of  Lydgate,  Gower,  and 
especially  of  Chaucer.    Cf.  W a.rton,  J7ist.  Eng.  Poetry  3.  121  :  "This 


114 


NOTES. 


unfortunate  monarch  was  educated  while  a  prisoner  in  England,  at  the 
command  of  our  Henry  IV.,  and  the  poem  was  written  during  his 
captivity  there.  The  Scottish  historians  represent  him  as  a  prodigy  of 
erudition.  He  civilized  the  Scottish  nation."  Sidney  may  have  derived 
his  information  in  part  from  the  historian  Buchanan  (cf.  44  33). 

With  the  foregoing  cf.  Meres  (Haslewood,  2.  155-6):  "Among 
others  in  times  past,  poets  had  these  favorers,  Augustus,  Maecenas, 
Sophocles,  Germanicus,  —  an  emperor,  a  nobleman,  a  senator,  and  a 
captain;  so  of  later  times  poets  have  these  patrons,  —  Robert,  King  of 
Sicily,  the  great  King  Francis  of  France,  King  James  of  Scotland,  and 
Queen  Elizabeth  of  England." 

44  29.  Bembus.  According  to  Symonds,  Re7iaissance  in  Italy  2.  410, 
"the  fullest  representative  of  his  own  age  of  culture"  (1470-1547). 
See  also  Symonds,  5.  264-5  •  "  "^^^  untiring  in  his  literary  industry, 
unfailing  in  his  courtesy  to  scholars,  punctual  in  correspondence,  and 
generous  in  the  use  he  made  of  his  considerable  wealth.  At  Urbino, 
at  Venice,  at  Rome,  and  at  Padua,  his  study  was  the  meeting-place  of 
learned  men,  who  found  the  graces  of  the  highest  aristocracy  combined 
in  him  with  genial  enthusiasm  for  the  common  interests  of  letters." 

Bibbiena.  1470-1520.  He  is  best  remembered  by  his  comedy,  the 
Calandra,  which  is  modelled  upon  the  MencEchmi  of  Plautus. 

44  30.  Beza.  A  famous  Biblical  scholar  (1519-1605).  His  poetry 
is  not  remarkable  either  for  quantity  or  quality,  and  consists  of  some 
verses  composed  in  youth,  a  translation  of  certain  Psalms,  and  a  comedy, 
all  of  which  are  now  forgotten. 

Melanchthon.  1497-1560.  Scaliger,  Poetics ,  308.  c.  I,  praises  his 
poems  on  the  eclipses  of  the  sun  and  the  moon. 

44  31.  Fracastorius.  1483-1553.  He  spent  the  greater  portion  of 
his  life  at  Verona,  "  enjoying  high  reputation  as  a  physician,  philoso- 
pher, astronomer,  and  poet."    Symonds,  Renaissance  in  Italy  2.  477. 

Scaliger.  1484-1558.  The  author  of  the  Poetics,  and  other  learned 
works.    He  also  composed  Latin  poetry  of  no  particular  celebrity. 

44  32.  Pontanus.  Cf.  note  on  10  2.  Besides  the  poem  there  men- 
tioned, Pontanus  wrote  pastorals,  elegies,  odes,  etc.  Symonds  says  of 
him  (^Renaissance  in  Italy  5.  220)  :  "  In  Pontano,  as  in  Poliziano, 
Latin  verse  lived  again  with  new  and  genuine  vitality." 

Muretus.  A  French  scholar  (i 526-1 585),  who  wrote  hymns,  besides 
certain  juvenile  verses.  It  is  not  a  little  remarkable  that  Sidney  should 
pay  him  this  honor,  since  he  must  have  been  abhorrent  to  all  good 
Protestants  as  the  eulogist  of  the  Massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew. 

44  33.   George  Buchanan.    A  Scotch  author  (i  506-1 582).  Besides 


NOTES. 


115 


other  original  poems,  and  translations  from  the  Psalms  and  Euripides 
into  Latin  verse,  he  wrote  two  Latin  tragedies,  jfephthah  and  John  the 
Baptist.  His  chief  other  works  are  a  History  of  Scotland  and  a  trea- 
tise on  Government  in  Scotland^  both  in  Latin.  Of  his  John  the  Bap- 
tist there  is  an  English  translation  in  Peck's  New  Memoirs  of  Miltott. 

With  the  foregoing  cf.  Meres  (Haslewood,  2.  156)  :  "As  in  former 
times  two  great  cardinals,  Bembus  and  Bibbiena,  did  countenance  poets, 
so  of  late  years  two  great  preachers  have  given  them  their  right  hands 
in  fellowship,  Beza  and  Melanchthon.  As  the  learned  philosophers 
Fracastorius  and  Scaliger  have  highly  prized  them,  so  have  the  eloquent 
orators  Pontanus  and  Muretus  very  gloriously  estimated  them.  As 
Georgius  Buchananus'  Jephtha  amongst  all  modern  tragedies  is  able  to 
abide  the  touch  of  Aristotle's  precepts  and  Euripides'  examples  "... 

44  34.  Hospital  of  France.  Michel  de  I'Hospital  (1504-1573), 
Chancellor  of  France,  the  type  of  moderation  in  an  age  of  violence  and 
intolerance.  His  works  include  a  number  of  Latin  poems.  He  gives 
a  pleasing  picture  of  his  occupations  after  his  retirement  from  court, 
in  a  letter  quoted  by  Villemain,  Atudes  d^histoire  moderne,  pp.  327-8: 
"  There  my  amusements  are  of  a  rather  serious  nature,  whether  I  hold 
in  my  hands  the  works  of  Xenophon,  or  the  divine  Plato  pours  into 
my  ears  the  words  of  Socrates.  I  frequently  amuse  myself  with  re- 
reading the  great  poets,  a  Virgil  or  a  Homer.  I  like  to  follow  up  the 
reading  of  a  tragic  poet  by  that  of  a  comedy,  mingling  sadness  and 
gaiety,  sportiveness  and  grief.  But  to  me  there  is  no  work  comparable 
to  the  Holy  Scriptures.  There  is  none  in  which  the  mind  reposes  with 
so  sweet  a  contentment,  and  in  which  it  finds  so  sure  a  refuge  from 
every  ill.  These  are  the  studies  in  which  I  should  like  to  pass  all  the 
remaining  moments  of  my  life." 

Than  whofn.    Cf.  Lounsbury,  Hist.  Eng.  Lang.  p.  236. 

45  5.   Only.    Note  the  position  of  this  word. 

45  G.  Hard  welcome.  Cf.  Puttenham,  Bk.  L  ch.  8:  "But  in  these 
days,  although  some  learned  princes  may  take  delight  in  them,  yet 
universally  it  is  not  so.  For  as  well  poets  as  poesy  are  despised,  and 
the  name  become  of  honorable,  infamous,  subject  to  scorn  and  derision, 
and  rather  a  reproach  than  a  praise  to  any  that  useth  it." 

45  13.  Mountebanks.  Cf.  Sidney's  letter  to  his  brother,  quoted  in 
Fox  Bourne,  Memoir^  p.  222 :  "  I  think  ere  it  be  long,  like  the  mounte- 
bank in  Italy,  we  travellers  shall  be  made  sport  of  in  comedies." 

45  16.  Hath  rather  be.  A  notable  example  of  a  disputed  construc- 
tion.    Troubled  in  the  net.     Odyssey  8.  266-366. 

45  22.  Epamino7idas.    Cf.  Plutarch,  Political  Precepts  {Morals  5. 


116 


NOTES. 


125-6):  "  Epaminondas  being  by  the  Thebans  through  envy  and  in 
contempt  appointed  telearch,  did  not  reject  it,  but  said  that  the  office 
does  not  show  the  man,  but  the  man  also  the  office.  He  brought  the 
telearchate  into  great  and  venerable  repute,  which  was  before  nothing 
but  a  certain  charge  of  the  carrying  the  dung  out  of  the  narrow  streets 
and  lanes  of  the  city,  and  turning  of  water  courses.  .  .  .  Though  he 
who  in  his  own  person  manages  and  does  many  such  things  for  himself 
may  be  judged  mean-spirited  and  mechanical,  yet  if  he  does  them  for 
the  public  and  for  his  country,  he  is  not  to  be  deemed  sordid;  but  on 
the  contrary,  his  dihgence  and  readiness,  extending  even  to  these  small 
matters,  is  to  be  esteemed  greater  and  more  highly  to  be  valued." 

45  33.  QueiSf  etc.  Sidney  makes  one  line  out  of  parts  of  two.  The 
original  (Juvenal  14.  34-5)  has: 

Quibus  arte  benigna 
Et  meliore  luto  finxit  prascordia  Titan. 

The  sixteenth  century  editions  must  more  frequently  have  had  queis 
instead  of  quibus,  since  Montaigne  (Bk.  1.  ch.  24)  also  has  this  reading. 
In  English  the  passage  will  run :  "  Whose  hearts  the  Titan  has  (formed 
with  kindlier  art,  and)  moulded  out  of  better  clay."  The  Titan  is 
Prometheus. 

46  4.  Paper -blur vers.    Cf.  578. 

46  6.  In  despite  of  Pallas.  Against  the  grain.  Lat.  invita  Minerva, 
invita  Pallade.  Cf.  Ovid,  Fasti  3.  826 :  "  Nor  will  any  one  be  able  to 
make  neatly  the  sandals  for  the  foot  if  Pallas  is  unpropitious,  even 
though  he  were  more  skilful  than  Tychius;  and  even  if,  compared  with 
ancient  Epeus,  he  should  excel  him  in  handicraft,  yet  if  Pallas  is  dis- 
pleased, he  will  be  but  a  bungler."  See  also  Horace,  Art  of  Poetry 
385  :  "  But  you,  my  friend,  will  say  and  do  nothing  against  the  bent 
of  your  genius."  Still  another  instance  will  be  found  in  Cicero,  Oit 
Duties  I.  31.  no. 

46  9.  Myself    Cf.  55  6. 

46  13.  Look  themselves.    Note  the  construction. 
46  14.   Unflattering  glass.    See  note  on  28  24. 
46  15.  Must  not  be  drawn.    Cf.  note  on  13  4. 

4618.  Divine  gift.  So  Harington  (Haslewood,  2.  123):  "He  doth 
prove  nothing  more  plainly  than  that  which  M.  Sidney  and  all  the 
learneder  sort  that  have  written  of  it  do  pronounce,  namely,  that  it  is 
a  gift  and  not  an  art." 

46  22.  Orator,  etc.    The  orator  is  made,  the  poet  is  born. 

46  23.  Manured.    Cultivated,  tilled. 


NOTES. 


117 


46  34.  Matter .  .  and  words.  Cf.  Bacon,  De  Augmentis  2.  13 
(  Works  4.  315)  :  "Now  poesy  ...  is  taken  in  two  senses;  in  respect 
of  words  or  matter.  In  the  first  sense  it  is  but  a  character  of  speech; 
for  verse  is  only  a  kind  of  style  and  a  certain  form  of  elocution, 
and  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  matter;  for  both  true  history  may  be 
written  in  verse  and  feigned  history  in  prose.  But  in  the  latter  sense, 
I  have  set  it  down  from  the  first  as  one  of  the  principal  branches  of 
learning,  and  placed  it  by  the  side  of  history;  being  indeed  nothing 
else  but  an  imitation  of  history  at  pleasure.  ...  I  dismiss  from  the 
present  discourse  satires,  elegies,  epigrams,  odes,  and  the  like,  and 
refer  them  to  philosophy  and  arts  of  speech.  And  under  the  name  of 
poesy,  I  treat  only  of  feigned  history."    Cf.  his  Adv.  Learning  2.  4.  I. 

47  3.   Quicquidj  etc.    Ovid's  verse  (  Tristia  4.  10.  26)  is : 

Et  quod  tentabam  dicere,  versus  erat, 

or,  translated :  "  And  whatever  I  tried  to  express,  the  same  was  poetry." 
Another  reading,  which  has  only  a  single  authority  in  its  favor,  is 
conabar  for  tentabam.  Both  editions  of  Sidney  have  erit,  thus  chang- 
ing the  preterit  into  a  future,  and  one,  Ponsonby,  has  conabor,  to  agree 
with  the  change  from  erat  to  erit.  It  is  accordingly  difBcult  to  decide 
which  tense  Sidney  meant  to  set  down,  especially  since  he  is  otherwise 
inexact  in  the  quotation  of  this  line,  as  in  other  places.  The  form  of 
our  text  is  that  quoted  by  Meres  (Haslewood,  2.  157). 

47  8-9.    Either  .  .  .  or.    Note  the  peculiar  construction. 

47  11.  Mirror  of  Magistrates.  Cf.  Brooke,  Eng.  Lit.,  pp.  60-1  :  "  The 
Mirror  of  Magistrates^  I559>  ^^^^  which  he  (i.e.  Sackville)  wrote  the 
Lnduction  and  one  tale,  is  a  poem  on  the  model  of  Boccaccio's  Falls 
of  Princes,  already  imitated  by  Lydgate.  Seven  poets,  along  with 
Sackville,  contributed  tales  to  it,  but  his  poem  is  the  only  one  of  any 
value.  .  .  .  Being  written  in  the  manner  and  stanza  of  the  elder  poets, 
this  poem  has  been  called  the  transition  between  Lydgate  and  Spenser. 
But  it  does  not  truly  belong  to  the  old  time;  it  is  as  modern  as 
Spenser." 

47  17.  Allow.    Sanction,  commend. 

47  20.  Not  .  .  .  but.    Note  the  peculiarity. 

47  22.  Ln  prose.  Cf.  Plato,  Republic  10.  601  (Jowett  3.496)  :  "And 
I  think  that  you  must  know,  for  you  have  often  seen  what  a  poor 
appearance  the  tales  of  poets  make  when  stripped  of  the  colors  which 
music  puts  upon  them,  and  recited  in  prose." 

47  24.  Another.  Adapted  by  Harington  (Haslew^ood,  2.  131)  :  "One 
doth,  as  it  were,  bring  on  another." 


118 


NOTES. 


47  30.  Gorboduc.  Cf.  Morley,  First  Sketch,  pp.  332  ff. :  "  An  un- 
authorised edition  of  it  was  pubhshed  in  1565,  as  The  Tragedy  of 
Gorboduc.  .  .  .  The  authorised  edition  of  it  did  not  appear  until  1571, 
and  in  that  the  name  of  the  play  appeared  as  Ferrex  and  Fo7'rex.  The 
argument  was  taken  from  Geoffrey  of  Monmouth's  '  History  of  British 
Kings,'  and  was  chosen  as  a  fit  lesson  for  Englishmen  in  the  first  year 
of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth.  It  was  a  call  to  Englishmen  to  cease  from 
strife  among  themselves,  and  knit  themselves  into  one  people,  obedient 
to  one  undisputed  rule.  Each  act  is  opened  with  a  masque,  or  dumb- 
show;  and  as  the  play  was  modelled  on  the  Tragedies  of  Seneca,  there 
was  at  the  close  of  every  act  except  the  last  a  chorus.  Except  for  the 
choruses,  Sackville  and  Norton  used  the  newly-introduced  blank  verse 
as  the  measure  of  their  tragedy.  .  .  .  Thus  our  first  tragedy  distinctly 
grew  out  of  the  life  of  its  own  time,  and  gave  expression  to  much  that 
lay  deep  in  the  hearts  of  Englishmen  in  the  first  years  of  Elizabeth's 
reign."  For  the  argument  of  the  play  see  Warton,  Hist.  Eng.  Poetry 
4.  256. 

47  31.  As.  That. 

47  34.  N'otable  morality.  Cf.  Warton,  Hist.  Eng.  Poetry  4.  260: 
"  Sir  Philip  Sidney  .  .  .  remarks  that  this  tragedy  is  full  of  *  notable 
moralitie.'  But  tragedies  are  not  to  instruct  us  by  the  intermixture  of 
moral  sentences,  but  by  the  force  of  example  and  the  effect  of  the  story. 
In  the  first  act,  the  three  counsellors  are  introduced  debating  about  the 
division  of  the  kingdom  in  long  and  elaborate  speeches,  which  are 
replete  with  political  advice  and  maxims  of  civil  prudence.  By  this 
stately  sort  of  declamation,  whatever  eloquence  it  may  display,  and 
whatever  policy  it  may  teach,  is  undramatic,  unanimated,  and  unaffect- 
ing.  Sentiment  and  argument  will  never  supply  the  place  of  action 
upon  the  stage.  .  .  .  But  we  must  allow,  that  in  the  strain  of  dialogue 
in  which  they  are  professedly  written,  they  (i.e.  the  speeches)  have 
uncommon  merit,  even  without  drawing  an  apology  in  their  favor  from 
their  antiquity;  and  that  they  contain  much  dignity,  strength  of  reflec- 
tion, and  good  sense,  couched  in  clear  expression  and  polished  numbers." 

48  5.  For  where,  etc.  Cf.  Symonds,  Shakspere's  Predecessors,  p.  258 : 
"These  canons  the  Italians  had  already  compiled  from  passages  of 
Aristotle  and  of  Horace,  without  verifying  them  by  appeal  to  the  Greek 
dramatic  authors.  They  were  destined  to  determine  the  practice  of 
the  great  French  writers  of  the  seventeenth  century,  and  to  be  accepted 
as  incontrovertible  by  every  European  nation,  until  Victor  Hugo  with 
Hernani  raised  the  standard  of  belligerent  Romanticism  on  the  stage 
of  Paris." 


NOTES. 


119 


48  8.  Aristotle's  precept.  Cf.  the  Poetics^  ch.  5:  *' Tragedy  seeks  to 
bring  the  action  within  the  compass  of  a  single  revolution  of  the  sun, 
or  to  vary  but  slightly  from  that  limit."  See  the  quotation  from  Milton 
in  the  note  on  50  5. 

48  9.  There  is  .  .  .  days.  This  construction  is  common  in  Shake- 
speare, as  in  CcBS.  3.  2.  29,  "There  is  tears  for  his  love,"  or  Macb, 

2.  3.  146,  "There's  daggers  in  men's  smiles." 

48 12.  Asia.  Cf.  Cervantes,  Don  Quixote,  Bk.  I.  ch.  48 :  "  What 
greater  folly  can  there  be  in  the  subject  of  our  debate,  than  to  see  a 
child  appear  in  swaddling-clothes  in  the  first  scene  of  the  first  act,  and 
in  the  second  a  goodly  aged  man  with  a  beard?  .  .  .  What  shall  I 
say  also  of  their  observance  of  the  time  in  which  are  to  happen  the 
acts  which  they  present,  except  that  I  have  seen  a  comedy  in  which 
the  first  act  opened  in  Europe,  the  second  in  Asia,  the  third  in  Africa; 
and,  had  there  been  four  acts,  the  fourth  would  have  ended  in  America, 
and  the  play  would  have  travelled  to  all  the  four  parts  of  the  world." 

48  15.    Telling  where  he  is.    Cf.  Collier,  Hist.  Eitg.  Dram.  Poetry 

3.  375  :  "  Sometimes  the  fact  appears  to  have  been  communicated  in 
the  prologue,  and  at  others  it  was  formally  announced  by  one  of  the 
actors.  When  old  Hieronimo,  in  Kyd's  Spanish  Tragedy,  is  about  to 
present  his  play  within  a  play  to  the  King  and  Court,  he  exclaims, 
*  Our  scene  is  Rhodes.' " 

48  29.  Groiveth  a  man.  Whetstone  had  already,  in  his  dedication 
to  Promos  and  Cassandra  (printed  1578),  uttered  a  similar  racy  cen- 
sure (Hazlitt's  Shak.  Lib.  Part  II.  Vol.  2,  p.  204,  or  Collier's  Hist.  Eitg, 
Dram.  Poetry  2.  422)  :  "The  Englishman  in  this  quality  is  most  vain, 
indiscreet,  and  out  of  order :  he  first  grounds  his  work  on  impossibili- 
ties; then  in  three  hours  runs  he  through  the  world,  marries,  gets  chil- 
dren, makes  children  men,  men  to  conquer  kingdoms,  murder  monsters, 
and  bringeth  gods  from  heaven  and  fetcheth  devils  from  hell."  Cf. 
also  the  note  on  48  11. 

48  35.  Matter  of  two  days.  The  next  three  or  four  lines  are  some- 
what obscure.  The  play  mentioned  contains  in  one  sense  matter  of 
two  days,  inasmuch  as  Phaedria  is  sent  away  for  that  length  of  time; 
but  he  actually  returns  within  the  day,  and  the  action  is  completed 
within  that  time.  One  is  tempted  to  believe  that  Sidney  meant  the 
Heautojttimorumenos,  concerning  which  see  Dryden,  Essay  of  Draf?iatic 
Poesy  (Arnold's  ed.,  31  16-21)  :  "The  unity  of  time  even  Terence  him- 
self, who  was  the  best  and  most  regular  of  them,  has  neglected.  His 
Heautontimorumenos,  or  Self-Punisher,  takes  up  visibly  two  days,  says 
Scaliger,  the  two  first  acts  concluding  the  first  day,  the  three  last  the 


120 


NOTES. 


day  ensuing."  Yet  far  short.  We  should  expect  *  yet  not  far  short.* 
The  time  is  actually  not  far  from  fifteen  years. 

49  2.  Played  in  two  days.  If  this  means  that  two  days,  or  parts  of 
two  days,  were  occupied  in  the  representation,  it  would  seem  to  be  an 
inaccurate  statement,  unless  it  is  to  be  understood  of  the  Heautontimo- 
rumenos.  Cf.  the  note  on  p.  158  of  the  Bohn  translation:  "Madame 
Dacier  absolutely  considers  it  as  a  fact  beyond  all  doubt  that  the  Roman 
audience  went  home  after  the  first  two  acts  of  the  play,  and  returned 
for  the  representation  of  the  third  the  next  morning  at  daybreak. 
Scaliger  was  of  the  same  opinion,  but  it  is  not  generally  entertained  by 
commentators." 

49  3.  And  though  Plautus.  Possibly  referring  to  the  Captiviy  in 
which  some  commentators  have  detected  a  violation  of  the  unity  of 
time.  Between  the  end  of  the  second  and  the  beginning  of  the  fourth 
act,  one  of  the  characters,  Philocrates,  "  has  taken  ship  from  the  coast 
of  vEtolia,  arrived  in  Elis,  procured  the  liberation  of  Philopolemus,  and 
returned  with  him,  all  in  the  space  of  a  few  hours.  This,  however, 
although  the  coast  of  Elis  was  only  fifteen  miles  from  that  of  ^tolia, 
is  not  at  all  consistent  with  probability;  and  the  author  has  been  much 
censured  by  some  commentators,  especially  by  Lessing,  on  account  of 
his  negligence.  It  must,  however,  be  remembered  that  Plautus  was 
writing  for  a  Roman  audience,  the  greater  part  of  whom  did  not  know 
whether  Elis  was  one  mile  or  one  hundred  from  the  coast  of  yEtolia." 
(Note  in  Bohn's  translation.)    Cf.  also  the  note  on  50  14. 

49  7.  Laws  of  poesy.    Cf.  note  on  18  25. 

49  16.  Pacolefs.  Cf.  Wheeler,  N'oted  Nafnes  of  Fiction  :  "  A  character 
in  the  old  romance  of  *  Valentine  and  Orson,'  who  owned  an  enchanted 
steed,  often  alluded  to  by  early  writers." 

49  17.  Nuntius.  Messenger.  Cf.  what  Moulton,  Anc.  Class.  Drama, 
p.  145,  says  of  the  Messenger's  Speech :  "  This  is  a  device  by  which 
one  of  the  incidents  in  the  story,  occurring  outside  the  unity  of  place, 
and  thus  incapable  of  being  acted,  is  instead  presented  in  description, 
and  treated  with  a  vividness  and  fulness  of  narration  that  is  an  equiva- 
lent for  realisation  on  the  stage." 

49  20.  Ab  ovo.  From  the  egg,  or,  more  freely,  from  the  first  course 
of  the  meal;  in  general,  from  the  beginning.  The  quotation  is  from 
Horace,  Sat,  i.  3.  6. 

49  23.  Stoiy.  From  the  Hecuba  of  Euripides.  Sidney's  choice  of 
this  play  may  be  accounted  for  by  Mahaffy's  statement.  Hist.  Grk.  Lit, 
I.  344:  "The  Hecuba  has  always  been  a  favorite  play,  and  has  not 
only  been  frequently  imitated,  but  edited  ever  since  Erasmus'  time  for 


NOTES. 


121 


school  use."  Notwithstanding  Sidney's  praise,  the  unities  are  somewhat 
violated  in  it.  Cf.  Mahaffy,  as  above :  "  It  treats  of  the  climax  of 
Hecuba's  misfortunes,  the  sacrifice  of  Polyxena  at  the  grave  of  Achilles, 
and  the  murder  of  Polydorus,  her  youngest  son,  by  the  Thracian  host, 
Polymestor.  ...  It  is  to  be  noted  that  the  scene  being  laid  in  Thrace, 
and  the  tomb  of  Achilles  being  in  the  Troad,  the  so-called  unity  of 
place  is  here  violated,  as  often  elsewhere  in  Greek  tragedy.  .  .  .  The 
narrative  of  her  (Polyxena's)  death  .  .  .  forms  a  beautiful  conclusion 
to  the  former  half  of  the  play,  which  is  divided,  like  many  of  Euripides', 
between  two  interests  more  or  less  loosely  connected." 

50  5.  Kings  and  clozvns.  Cf.  Whetstone  (as  in  note  to  48  29)  :  "  And 
—  that  which  is  worst  —  their  ground  is  not  so  unperfect  as  their  work- 
ing indiscreet;  not  weighing,  so  the  people  laugh,  though  they  laugh 
them,  for  their  follies,  to  scorn;  many  times,  to  make  mirth,  they 
make  a  clown  companion  with  a  king;  in  their  grave  councils  they 
allow  the  advice  of  fools;  yea,  they  use  one  order  of  speech  for  all 
persons,  a  gross  indecorum."  To  the  same  effect  Milton  in  his  preface 
to  Sa7?ison  Agonistes :  "  This  is  mentioned  to  vindicate  tragedy  from 
the  small  esteem,  or  rather  infamy,  which  in  the  account  of  many  it 
undergoes  at  this  day  with  other  common  interludes;  happening  through 
the  poet's  error  of  intermixing  comic  stuff  with  tragic  sadness  and 
gravity,  or  introducing  trivial  and  vulgar  persons,  which  by  all  judicious 
hath  been  accounted  absurd,  and  brought  in  without  discretion,  cor- 
ruptly to  gratify  the  people.  .  .  .  The  circumscription  of  time  wherein 
the  whole  drama  begins  and  ends,  is,  according  to  ancient  rule  and 
best  example,  within  the  space  of  twenty-four  hours." 

But  cf.  Moulton,  S/iak.  as  a  Dram.  Artist^  pp.  219-220 :  "The 
institution  of  the  court  fool  is  eagerly  utilised  by  Shakespeare,  and  is 
the  source  of  some  of  his  finest  effects;  he  treats  it  as  a  sort  of  chronic 
Comedy,  the  function  of  which  may  be  described  as  that  of  translating 
deep  truths  of  human  nature  into  the  language  of  laughter." 

50  9.  Tragi-co77tedy.  Cf.  Mahaffy,  Hist.  Grk.  Lit.  2.  411  :  "Greek 
tragedy,  being  essentially  religious,  became  in  the  hands  of  its  greate^^t 
masters  so  serious  a  thing,  that  the  relief  of  humorous  or  low  scenes 
was  hardly  permitted.  Aristotle  indeed  gives  us  to  understand  in  his 
sketch  of  its  history  that  this  was  not  so  originally,  that  it  arose  from 
a  satyric  representation,  of  which  the  grotesque  side  was  preserved  in 
the  satyric  afterpiece,  when  banished  from  serious  tragedy.  This  sev- 
erance was  exaggerated  by  the  French  school  of  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury, w^ho  are  far  more  particular  than  the  less  artificial  Greek  masters 
in  avoiding  the  lower  side  of  human  nature.    And  such,  too,  was  the 


122 


NOTES, 


opinion  of  Milton,  but  happily  for  us  Shakespere  gave  the  law  for  a 
wider  conception,  and  since  his  day,  even  in  theory,  the  comic  or 
humorous  element  is  admitted  and  even  admired  as  a  merit  of  contrast 
in  our  tragedies."  Shakespeare,  however,  was  not  the  first  to  proclaim 
this  law.  It  was  already  virtually  announced  by  Plato,  Syuiposium  223 
(Jowett  2.  74)  ;  "  The  chief  thing  which  he  remembered  was  Socrates 
compelling  the  other  two  to  acknowledge  that  the  genius  of  comedy 
was  the  same  as  that  of  tragedy,  and  that  the  true  artist  in  tragedy  was 
an  artist  in  comedy  also."  The  explanation  of  this  harmony  or  identity 
is  thus  given  by  Everett,  Poetry^  Comedy,  and  Duty,  p.  166:  "The 
circumstances  which  suggest  the  comic  are  very  naturally  those  which 
are,  to  a  greater  or  less  extent,  really  tragic.  The  tragic  is,  like  the 
comic,  simply  the  incongruous.  .  .  .  Thus  it  is  that  there  is  nothing 
tragic  that  may  not  to  some  persons,  or  to  some  moods,  be  comic. 
Take  the  great  tragedies  themselves.  Take  the  story  of  QEdipus :  A 
man  goes  forth  to  meet  another,  whom  he  does  not  know,  and  kills 
him;  this  stranger  turns  out  to  be  his  father.  He  falls  in  love  with  a 
woman  that  he  meets,  and  marries  her;  she  proves  to  be  his  mother. 
Shall  we  have  out  of  all  this  a  tragedy  or  a  comedy?  This  depends 
upon  the  taste  of  the  author,  or  of  the  audience  for  whom  he  writes." 

The  historical  process  is  thus  commented  upon  by  Moulton,  Shak, 
as  a  Dram.  Artist,  pp.  292-3;  "The  exclusive  and  uncompromising 
spirit  of  antiquity  carried  caste  into  art  itself,  and  their  Tragedy  and 
Comedy  were  kept  rigidly  separate,  and  indeed  were  connected  with 
different  rituals.  The  spirit  of  modern  life  is  marked  by  its  compre- 
hensiveness and  reconciliation  of  opposites;  and  nothing  is  more  im- 
portant in  dramatic  history  than  the  way  in  which  Shakespeare  and  his 
contemporaries  created  a  new  departure  in  art,  by  seizing  upon  the 
rude  jumble  of  sport  and  earnest  which  the  mob  loved,  and  converting 
it  into  a  source  of  stirring  passion-effects.  For  a  new  faculty  of  mental 
grasp  is  generated  by  this  harmony  of  tones  in  the  English  Drama.  If 
the  artist  introduces  every  tone  into  the  story  he  thereby  gets  hold 
of  every  tone  in  the  spectators'  emotional  nature.  .  .  .  Moreover  it 
brings  the  world  of  fiction  nearer  to  the  world  of  nature,  which  has 
never  yet  evolved  an  experience  in  which  brightness  was  dissevered 
from  gloom." 

Lope  de  Vega  had  already  anticipated  the  latter  part  of  Moulton's 
justification.  Lessing  says.  Dramatic  Notes,  No.  69  (Bohn's  tr.,  p. 
394)  :  "  Although  Lope  de  Vega  is  regarded  as  the  creator  of  the 
Spanish  theatre,  it  was  not  he  who  introduced  the  hybrid  tone.  The 
people  were  already  so  accustomed  to  it,  that  he  had  to  assume  it 


NOTES. 


123 


against  his  will.  In  his  didactic  poem  concerning  the  art  of  making 
new  comedies,  he  greatly  laments  the  fact."  The  words  of  Lope  de 
Vega,  as  quoted  by  Lessing  (p.  395),  are  as  follows:  "It  is  therefore 
somewhat  difficult  to  me  to  approve  our  fashion.  But  since  we  in 
Spain  do  so  Tar  diverge  from  art,  the  learned  must  keep  silent  on  this 
point.  It  is  true  that  the  tragic  fused  with  the  comic,  Seneca  mingled 
with  Terence,  produces  no  less  a  monster  than  was  Pasiphae's  *  Mino- 
taur.' But  this  abnormity  pleases,  people  will  not  see  any  other  plays 
but  such  as  are  half  serious,  half  ludicrous,  nature  herself  teaches  this 
variety,  from  which  she  borrows  part  of  her  beauty." 

A  wise  caveat  is  uttered  by  Shelley,  Defense  of  Poetry  :  "  The  mod- 
ern practice  of  blending  comedy  with  tragedy,  though  liable  to  great 
abuse  in  point  of  practice,  is  undoubtedly  an  extension  of  the  dramatic 
circle;  but  the  comedy  should  be  as  in  King  Lear,  universal,  ideal,  and 
sublime."  Cf.  also  Ulrici,  Shakespeare's  Dram.  Art  i.  368-370;  Schle- 
gel's  Dram.  Lit.y  pp.  369-371;  Ilamiet  2.  2.  415-420. 

50  10.  Apideius.  A  writer  of  the  second  century  A.D.  His  Meta- 
morphoses, or  Golden  Ass,  is  here  referred  to.  See  Bohn's  translation, 
or  Dunlop,  History  of  Fiction. 

50 14.  Amphytrio.  Cf.  the  prologue  to  this  play:  "I'll  tell  the  sub- 
ject of  this  tragedy.  Why  do  you  contract  your  brows?  .  .  .  This 
same,  if  you  wish  it,  from  a  tragedy  I'll  make  to  be  a  comedy,  with  all 
the  lines  the  same.  .  .  .  I'll  make  this  to  be  a  mixture  —  a  tragi- 
comedy. For  me  to  make  it  entirely  to  be  a  comedy,  where  kings  and 
gods  appear,  I  do  not  deem  right.  What  then?  Since  here  the  servant 
has  a  part  as  well,  just  as  I  said,  I'll  make  it  to  be  a  tragicomedy." 

50  15.  Daintily.  Almost  =  rarely.  Cf.  53  33.  Horjipipes  and  funerals. 
Cf.  Shakespeare,  Hml.  i.  2.  12-13: 

With  mirth  in  funeral  and  with  dirge  in  marriage, 
In  equal  scale  weighing  delight  and  dole. 

50  20.  Loud  laughter.  Cf.  Hml.  2.  42-8:  "And  let  those  that 
play  your  clowns  speak  no  more  than  is  set  down  for  them;  for  there 
be  of  them  that  will  themselves  laugh,  to  set  on  some  quantity  of  barren 
spectators  to  laugh  too,  though  in  the  mean  time  some  necessary  ques- 
tion of  the  play  be  then  to  be  considered." 

51  7.  Against  the  bias.  A  figure  taken  from  the  game  of  bowls  (cf. 
Phil.  Soc.  Eng.  Diet.  s.v.  bias).    See  Shak.  Shr.  4.  5.  24-5  : 

Well  forward,  forward  !  thus  the  bowl  should  run, 
And  not  unluckily  against  the  bias. 


124 


NOTES. 


Also  Rich.  II.  3.  4.  4-5  : 

'Twill  make  me  tliink  the  world  is  full  of  rubs, 
And  that  my  fortune  runs  against  the  bias. 

51 11.  Alexander's  picture.  Cf.  Plutarch,  Alexander  4 :  "  The  statues 
of  Alexander  that  most  resembled  him  were  those  of  Lysippus,  who 
alone  had  his  permission  to  represent  him  in  marble.  The  turn  of  his 
head,  which  leaned  a  little  to  one  side,  and  the  quickness  of  his  eye, 
in  which  many  of  his  friends  and  successors  most  affected  to  imitate 
him,  were  best  hit  off  by  that  artist.  Apelles  painted  him  in  the 
character  of  Jupiter  armed  with  thunder,  but  did  not  succeed  as  to  his 
complexion.  He  overcharged  the  coloring,  and  made  his  skin  too 
brown;  whereas  he  was  fair,  with  a  tinge  of  red  in  his  face  and  upon 
his  breast." 

5113.  Hercules.  Millin,  Mythologische  Gallerie,  No.  454  (2d  ed., 
Berlin  1836),  thus  describes  the  picture  to  which  Sidney  may  refer, 
though  it  must  be  remembered  that  he  had  never  visited  Rome : 
"  Hercules  is  represented  in  an  ancient  mosaic  of  the  Capitoline 
Museum  at  Rome  as  naked  from  his  waist  up,  the  lower  part  of  his 
body  being  clothed  in  the  attire  of  a  woman.  Into  the  waist  of  the 
dress  is  stuck  a  distaff,  from  which  he  is  pulling  the  thread  w  ith  one 
hand,  while  the  other  is  engaged  in  twirling  the  spindle.  His  coun- 
tenance is  sorrowful  and  downcast.  Beside  him  are  his  shield  and 
club,  while  on  the  ground  near  by  lie  an  overturned  vase,  a  thyrsus, 
and  bunches  of  grapes,  symbolical  of  the  Bacchic  orgies  in  which  he  has 
been  indulging  with  Omphale.  Two  Cupids,  one  of  w^hom  is  crowned 
with  a  chaplet  of  oak-leaves,  are  playing  with  a  fettered  lion,  while  a 
third  is  playing  on  a  Pan's-pipe."  See  also  the  illustration  of  the 
Farnese  group  at  Naples  in  Mrs.  Clement,  Handbook  Legend,  and  Myth, 
Art,  p.  456. 

51  18.  Scornfulness.  Used  in  the  passive  rather  than  the  active 
sense,  and  hence  nearly  —  disgracefulness.  Cf.  51  20,  and  Shakespeare, 
Lucrece  520,  '^The  scornful  mark  of  every  open  eye."  See  also  Abbott's 
Shak.  Gram.  §  3. 

5123.  Aristotle.  See  his  Ethics,  4.  9.  82  (Williams'  tr.,  p.  1 13): 
"The  witty  man  will  not  indulge  in  every  kind  of  ridicule.  For  all  ridi- 
cule is  a  species  of  abuse,  and  legislators,  inasmuch  as  they  forbid  cer- 
tain forms  of  abuse,  ought  perhaps  also  to  have  forbidden  certain  forms 
of  ridicule.  And  the  man  of  culture,  who  is  liberally-minded,  will  bear 
himself  according  to  these  rules,  and  be,  as  it  were,  a  law  unto  himself. 
Such  then  is  the  man  who  observes  the  correct  mean,  —  whether  it  is 


NOTES. 


125 


tact  which  we  are  to  say  that  he  has,  or  wit :  whereas  the  buffoon  can 
never  resist  the  ridiculous,  and,  provided  only  that  he  can  raise  a  laugh, 
will  spare  neither  himself  nor  anyone  else,  and  will  say  things  which 
no  gentleman  would  ever  say,  and  sometimes  even  things  to  which  no 
gentleman  would  submit  to  listen." 

51  28.  Jest  at  strangers.  As,  for  example,  in  Shakespeare's  Merry 
Wives  of  Windsor. 

5131.  Nil  habet,  etc.  From  Juvenal,  Sat.  3.  152-3:  "Poverty, 
bitter  though  it  be,  has  no  sharper  pang  than  this,  that  it  makes  men 
ridiculous." 

51  34.    T/iraso.    A  boastful  captain  in  The  Eunuch  of  Terence. 
Self-wise-seeming  schoolmaster.    Perhaps  Sidney  has  in  mind  Master 

Rhombus,  a  character  in  his  own  masque.  The  Lady  of  the  May. 
Another  example  would  be  Holofernes,  in  Lovers  Labor'' s  Lost. 

521.  Traveller.  Cf.  Shakespeare,^.  Y.  Z.  4.  i.  33-38:  "Farewell, 
Monsieur  Traveller :  look  you  lisp  and  wear  strange  suits,  disable  all 
the  benefits  of  your  own  country,  be  out  of  love  with  your  nativity  and 
almost  chide  God  for  making  you  that  countenance  you  are,  or  I  will 
scarce  think  you  have  swam  in  a  gondola." 

52  4.  Buchanan.  Cf.  44  33.  See  the  Diet.  Nat.  Biog.  under  his 
name  :  "  In  the  *  Baptistes  '  especially  the  virtue  of  liberty,  the  fear  of 
God  rather  than  of  man,  and  the  infamy  of  the  tyrant,  are  the  themes." 

52  13.  So  good  minds.  Sidney,  after  writing  the  lyrics  of  his  Astrophel 
and  Stella,  had  "  so  good  mind  "  given  him,  if  we  may  judge  from  his 
noble  sonnet : 

Leave  me,  O  Love,  wliich  reachest  but  to  dust, 

And  thou,  my  mind,  aspire  to  higher  things ; 

Grow  rich  in  that  which  never  taketh  rust ; 

What  ever  fades,  but  fading  pleasure  brings. 

Draw  in  thy  beams,  and  humble  all  thy  might 

To  that  sweet  yoke  where  lasting  freedoms  be. 

Which  breaks  the  clouds,  and  opens  forth  the  light 

That  doth  both  shine  and  give  us  sight  to  see. 

O  take  fast  hold ;  let  that  light  be  thy  guide 

In  this  small  course  which  birth  draws  out  to  death ; 

And  think  how  evil  becometh  him  to  slide. 

Who  seeketh  heaven,  and  comes  of  heavenly  breath. 

Then  farewell,  world ;  thy  uttermost  I  see ; 

Eternal  Love,  maintain  Thy  life  in  me. 

Splendidis  longum  valedico  nugis. 

[I  bid  a  long  farewell  to  splendid  toys.] 


126 


NOTES. 


Perhaps  Spenser  may  have  had  Sidney's  words  in  mind  when  he 
wrote  his  Hymns  of  Heavenly  Love  and  Beauty. 

52  21.  Banner.  Cf.  Song  of  Solomon  2.  4:  "His  banner  over  me 
was  love."     Unresistible.  Irresistible. 

5  2  26.  North-west  and  by  south.  Cf.  Shakespeare,  Hml.  2.  2.  396-7 : 
"  I  am  but  mad  north-north-west :  when  the  wind  is  southerly  I  know 
a  hawk  from  a  handsaw." 

52  29.  Energia,  This  is  the  Latinized  form  of  the  Greek  energeia. 
Cf.  Quintilian,  8.  3.  89;  Aristotle,  Rhet.  3.  11.  Apparently  the  word 
had  not  yet  become  Anglicized.  Energy  does  not  occur  in  Shake- 
speare. 

52  32.  Material.    Cf.  46  34. 

52  34.  Well  zvorse,  etc.  Sidney  is  castigating  Gosson,  though  he 
no  doubt  had  others  in  mind  also. 

5  2  35.  Matron  eloquence.  He  is  here  ringing  the  changes,  in  Gosson's 
own  style,  upon  the  latter's  words.  School  of  Ahuse^  p.  20 :  "  Pull  off 
the  vizard  that  poets  mask  in  .  .  .  you  shall  perceive  their  sharp 
sayings  to  be  placed  as  .  .  .  chaste  matrons'  apparel  on  common 
courtesans." 

53  4.  Coursing  of  a  letter.  Cf.  Shak.,  LLL.  4.  2.  56:  "I  will  some- 
thing affect  the  letter,  for  it  argues  facility." 

53  5-6.  Dictionary  .  .  .flowers.  Cf.  Sonnet  15  of  Astrophel  and 
Stella  : 

You  that  do  search  for  every  purling  spring 
Which  from  the  ribs  of  old  Parnassus  flows, 
And  every  flower,  not  sweet  perhaps,  which  grows 
Near  thereabouts,  into  your  poesy  wring ; 
Ye  that  do  dictionary's  method  bring 
Into  your  rimes,  running  in  rattling  rows, 

Cf.  also  Sonnet  3 : 

Or  Pindar's  apes  flaunt  in  their  phrases  fine, 
Enameling  their  pride  with  flowers  of  gold. 

53  7  ff.  But  I  would,  etc.  Sidney  is  still  ridiculing  Gosson,  and  in 
this  sentence  apparently  travestying  his  style.  Gosson  was  at  once 
or  in  succession  versifier,  prose-printer,  scholar,  and  preacher,  and 
obnoxious  to  Sidney.  For  proof  of  the  latter  statement  part  of  a  letter 
from  Spenser  to  Gabriel  Harvey  may  be  quoted,  bearing  date  of  October 
16,  1579:  "New  books  I  hear  of  none,  but  only  of  one  that,  writing  a 
certain  book  called  The  School  of  Abuse,  dind  dedicating  it  to  Master 
Sidney,  was  for  his  labor  scorned,  —  if  at  least  it  be  in  the  goodness  of 


NOTES. 


127 


that  nature  to  scorn.  Such  folly  is  it,  not  to  regard  aforehand  the 
inclination  and  quality  of  him  to  whom  we  dedicate  our  books."  This 
letter  may  be  found  in  Grosart's  ed.  of  Spenser,  9.  261-271. 

53  14.  Nizolian.  Adjective  formed  from  the  name  of  the  Italian 
lexicographer  Nizzoli,  or,  in  Latinized  form,  Nizolius  (1498-1566), 
whose  Ciceronian  lexicon  was  published  at  Basle  about  1530,  and  has 
been  frequently  reprinted. 

53  14.  Keep  Nizolian  paper-books.  As  Speron  Sperone  (i  500-1 588) 
is  related  to  have  done.  See  his  own  account  in  Symonds,  Kenaissatice 
in  Italy  5.  254 :  "  Using  the  greatest  diligence,  I  composed  a  rhyming 
dictionary  or  vocabulary  of  Italian  phrases,  in  the  which  I  classed  by 
the  alphabet  every  word  those  two  authors  had  used;  moreover  I  col- 
lected in  another  book  their  divers  ways  of  describing  things,  as  clay, 
night,  anger,  peace,  hate,  love,  fear,  hope,  beauty,  in  such  wise  that  not 
a  single  word  or  thought  came  from  me  which  had  not  its  precedent  in 
their  sonnets  and  novels." 

53  16.  Devour.  Cf.  Du  Bellay,  Defense  and  Illustration  of  the  French 
Tongue  (a.d.  1549),  Bk.  I.  ch.  7:  "By  what  means  then  have  the 
Romans  been  able  so  to  enrich  their  language  as  to  make  it  almost 
equal  to  the  Greek?  By  imitating  the  best  Greek  authors,  transforming 
themselves  into  them,  devouring  them,  and  after  having  thoroughly 
digested  them,  converting  them  into  blood  and  nutriment." 

53  17.  Sugar.  Cf.  Shakespeare's  A.  Y.  L.  3.  3.  31  :  "To  have  honey 
a  sauce  to  sugar." 

53  24.  Vivit,  etc.  Sidney  apparently  quoted  from  memory  (see  the 
Variants).  I  have  restored  the  true  reading  of  Cicero,  Catiline  i.  2: 
"  He  lives.    Lives?  ay,  he  comes  even  into  the  senate,"  etc. 

53  30.  Too  much  c holer.  I  suspect  that  Sidney  here  intends  a  pun 
upon  choler  and  color.  Shakespeare  frequently  plays  tricks  with  the 
word  choler.  If  my  supposition  is  correct,  Sidney  uses  color  in  the 
sense  of  figure  of  speech,  rhetorical  ornament,  artifice,  as  in  Chaucer, 
Prologue  of  the  Franklin'' s  Tale  : 

Colours  ne  knowe  I  non,  withouten  drede, 
But  swiche  colours  as  growen  in  the  mede, 
Or  elles  swiche  as  men  dye  with  or  peynte. 
Colours  of  rethoryke  been  to  queynte. 

If  this  surmise  is  correct,  we  must  understand :  "  When  it  were  too 
highly  rhetorical  to  simulate  anger." 

53  31.  Sifjiiliter  cadences.  A  partial  Anglicization  of  Quintilian's 
cadentia  similiter  (9.  4.  42),  a  translation  of  the  Greek  rhetorical  term 


128 


NOTES. 


diuLoi6nTcoTay  which  is  allied  to,  and  frequently  identical  with,  the  simi- 
liier  desineniia  or  djuoioTcXevTay  which  we  call  '  rime.'  An  example' 
occurs  in  Cicero,  Quiniiiis  23.  75  :  "  Ut,  si  vp-itatem  volent  retinere, 
gravitatem  possint  obtinere."  Another  example  may  be  taken  from 
Apuleius, /76?r.  21  ;  "  Camporum  rivos  et  colhum  clivos."  The  use  of 
this  figure  in  prose  was  censured  by  the  best  critics  of  antiquity,  as  by 
QuintiUan  in  the  passage-  cited,  though  it  is  allowed  under  certain  cir- 
cumstances. Cicero  mentions  it,  Character  of  ihe  Orator  3.  54.  206: 
"  The  use  of  words,  also,  which  end  similarly,  or  have  similar  cadences, 
or  which  balance  one  another,  or  which  correspond  to  one  another." 
Cf.  also  his  Orator  34.  135,  and  De  Mille,  Rhetoric,  §  264.  With 
respect  to  the  employment  of  these  figures  by  Demosthenes,  my  col- 
league, Professor  Goodell,  kindly  gives  me  this  statement ;  "  It  is  safe 
to  say  that  both  figures  occur  so  seldom  that  when  one  is  used  it  pro- 
duces, as  in  6.  21,  all  the  effect  of  which  such  a  figure  is  capable." 
That  in  6.  21  (Second  Philippic)  is  as  follows:  oh  KparrjOevT^s  ixovov 
aKKa  koX  Trpo^odeures  utt'  aWT}\ccu  Kal  TrpaSevTcs. 

54  3.  See77iing  fineness.  Cf.  Bacon,  De  Augmentis,  Bk.  VII.  ch.  i  : 
"  Seneca  says  well,  *  Eloquence  is  injurious  to  those  whom  it  inspires 
with  a  fondness  for  itself,  and  not  for  the  subject ' ;  for  writings  should 
be  such  as  should  make  men  in  love  with  the  lesson,  and  not  with  the 
teacher." 

54  5.  Similitudes.    Cf.  Astrophel  and  Stella,  3.  7-8  : 

Or  with  strange  similes  enrich  each  line, 
Of  herbs  or  beasts  which  Ind  or  Afric  hold. 

54 12.  Most  tedious  prattling.  Hinting  again  at  Gosson ;  cf.  his 
School  of  Abuse  throughout.  A  single  specimen  may  answer :  "  The 
fish  remora  hath  a  small  body,  and  great  force  to  stay  ships  against 
wind  and  tide;  ichneumon,  a  little  worm,  overcomes  the  elephant;  the 
viper  slays  the  bull,  the  weasel  the  cockatrice;  and  the  weakest  wasp 
stingeth  the  stoutest  man  of  war."  And  these  are  just  one-third  of  the 
number  of  similes  employed  to  illustrate  the  truth  that  small  things  are 
capable  of  producing  great  results.  Bacon  deplores  the  perpetuation 
of  errors  in  natural  history  through  this  means  {Adv.  Learning  2.  I.  3.)  • 
"  If  an  untruth  in  nature  be  once  on  foot,  .  .  .  what  by  reason  of  the 
use  of  the  opinion  in  similitudes  and  ornaments  of  speech,  it  is  never 
called  down."    Drayton  says  that  Sidney 

did  first  reduce 
Our  tongue  from  Lyly's  writing,  then  in  use, — 
Talking  of  stones,  stars,  plants,  of  fishes,  flies, 
Playing  with  words  and  idle  similes. 


NOTES. 


129 


54  16.  A7itonius.    143-87  B.C. 
5417.   Crassus.    140-91  B.C. 

54  18.  Pretended,  Cf.  Cicero,  Character  of  the  Orator  2.  I.  4:  "But 
there  was  such  peculiarity  in  each,  that  Crassus  desired  not  so  much 
to  be  thought  unlearned  as  to  hold  learning  in  contempt,  and  to  prefer, 
on  every  subject,  the  understanding  of  our  countrymen  to  that  of  the 
Greeks;  while  Antonius  thought  that  his  oratory  would  be  better 
received  by  the  Roman  people  if  he  were  believed  to  have  had  no 
learning  at  all."  Quintilian,  2.  17.  6,  calls  Antonius  "dissimulator 
artis." 

54  19.  Because,    In  order  that.    See  the  peculiar  uses  in  48  3,  53  21. 

54  21.  Credit.  Aristotle,  Rhet.  2.  I  :  "  It  is  a  highly  important 
element  of  proof  that  the  speaker  should  enjoy  the  credit  of  a  certain 
character,  and  should  be  supposed  by  his  audience  to  stand  in  a  certain 
relation  to  themselves."  Persuasion.  Aristotle,  i?/^^/.  i.  2  :  "Rhetoric 
may  be  defined  as  a  faculty  of  discovering  all  the  possible  means  of 
persuasion  in  any  subject." 

54  32.  Art.  The  jingle  on  this  word  is  perhaps  intended  as  ridicule 
of  the  Euphuists.  The  modern  fashion  was  originated,  or  at  least 
reinforced,  by  the  Spaniards  (see  Landmann,  Der  Euphuismus^  Giessen 
1 881),  and  accordingly  we  find  Cervantes  ridiculing  it  in  Don  Quixote. 
In  ch.  I  (Duffield's  tr.)  we  have :  "  The  reason  of  the  unreason  which 
is  done  to  my  reason  in  such  manner  enfeebles  my  reason  that  with 
reason  I  lament  your  beauty."  But  such  collocations,  which  are  often 
adduced  as  examples  of  barbarism  in  language,  are  recommended  to 
the  world  by  the  example  of  Cicero.  Thus,  On  Friendship  i.  5 : 
"  But  as  then  I,  an  old  man,  wrote  to  you,  who  are  an  old  man,  on  the 
subject  of  old  age;  so  in  this  book  I  myself,  a  most  sincere  friend,  have 
written  to  a  friend  on  the  subject  of  friendship";  this  is  still  more 
striking  in  the  original :  "  Sed  ut  tum  ad  senem  senex  de  senectute,  sic 
hoc  libro  ad  amicum  amicissimus  scripsi  de  amicitia."  Cf.  also  Limits 
of  Good  and  Evil  5.  6.  16,  but  especially  Character  of  an  Orator  i.  41. 
186 :  "  For  nothing  can  be  reduced  into  a  science  unless  he  who  under- 
stands the  matters  of  which  he  would  form  a  science  has  previously 
gained  such  knowledge  as  to  enable  him  to  constitute  a  science  out 
of  subjects  in  which  there  has  never  yet  been  any  science."  If  for 
*  science '  we  substitute  *  art,'  the  tone  of  the  original  will  be  more 
accurately  reproduced,  since  this  is  the  term  actually  employed  by 
Cicero.  If  Sidney  is  not  here  indulging  in  parody,  he  probably  is 
modeling  his  sentence  on  that  of  Cicero  last  quoted. 

55  10.  Matter  and  manner.    Cf.  46  34. 


130 


NOTES. 


55  25.  Compositions,  Cf.  note  on  8  2.  Sidney  employs  them  not 
only  in  prose,  but  in  the  comparatively  sober  style  of  the  Defense. 
Among  the  more  noticeable,  because  the  more  poetical,  of  such  epithets 
are :  death-bringing  9  32,  dull-making  58  4,  earth-creeping  58  5,  fine- 
witted  14  13,  heart-ravishing  5  16,  honey-flovv^ing  52  34,  ink-wasting  57  8, 
low-creeping  44  4,  never-leaving  9  33,  old-aged  14  12,  self-devouring 
17  4,  soon-repenting  17  3,  sweet-smelling  8  1,  through-beholding  32  19, 
through-searching  18  3,  well-accorded  29  15,  well-enchanting  23  24  (cf. 
well-raised  50  22,  well-sounding  47  32,  well-waiting  21  10,  well-weighed 
56  3),  winter-starved  53  6,  wry-transformed  51  34.  Many  of  these  seem 
to  be  translated  directly  from  Latin  or  Greek,  rather  than  borrowed 
from  the  French.  Thus,  death-bringing  =  mortifer  (used  by  Cicero  as 
well  as  Virgil) ;  earth-creeping,  low-creeping  =  xa/^airi'Tn^y,  xayuaiTreTT^s; 
honey-flowing  =  mellifluous,  /meAiynpuSf  jULeXiyXcoaa-os,  jxeXippvros,  etc. 
That  Sidney  was  capable  of  thus  translating  is  proved  by  his  coinage 
of  Greek  compounds  (cf.  22  18,  32  14).  Other  compounds  used  in  the 
Defense  are  :  after-livers  27  9  (after-thinker  used  by  Grote),  before-time 
38  33,  best-measured  33  21,  far-fet  25  11,  53  2,  fore-backwardly  46  30, 
fore-conceit  8  15,  good-fellow  24  33,  high  (est) -flying  5  35,  46  24,  light- 
giver  2  22,  many-fashioned  42  18,  many-formed  12  8,  new-budding  52  19, 
often-assaulted  38 17,  paper-blurrers  46  4,  poet-apes  57  5,  poet-haters 
3214,  poet-whippers  31  12,  school-art  41 10,  school-name  24  29,  small- 
learned  54  28,  virtue-breeding  57  1,  war-stratagem  20  31.  Those  in  -like 
are :  ass-like  43  9,  courtesan-like  53  1,  learner-like  1  11,  man-like  35  3, 
much-like  20 19,  planet-like  58  5,  soldier-like  29  28.  Compositions  of 
three  words  are:  self-wise-seeming  5134,  too-much-loved  8  2.  With 
respect  to  the  employment  of  compound  epithets,  there  has  been  and 
is  much  diversity  of  taste  and  practice.  Aristotle  condemns  it,  RheL 
3.  3 :  "  Faults  of  taste  occur  in  four  points  of  style.  Firstly,  in  the  use 
of  compound  words,  such  as  Lycophron's  '  many-visaged  heaven,'  *  vast- 
crested  earth,'  and  *  narrow-passaged  strand.'  .  .  .  There  are  instances 
too  in  Alcidamos,  e.g.  ...  *  he  thought  their  zeal  would  prove  end- 
executing,'  ...  or  *  steel-gray  the  ocean's  basement';  for  all  these  are 
terms  which,  as  being  compound,  have  a  certain  poetical  character." 
Yet  this  principle  has  been  frequently  disregarded  in  ornate  English 
prose,  especially  when  impassioned.  Take,  for  example,  such  a  sen- 
tence from  Ruskin  as  this :  "  The  low  bronzed  gleaming  of  sea-rusted 
armor  shot  angrily  under  their  blood-red  mantle-folds "  {Mod.  Faint, 
Part  IX.  ch.  9).  Or  this  (Part  VI.  ch.  10)  :  "To  them,  slow-fingered, 
constant-hearted,  is  entrusted  the  weaving  of  the  dark,  eternal  tapes- 
tries of  the  hills;  to  them,  slow-pencilled,  iris-dyed,  the  tender  framing 


NO  TES. 


131 


of  their  endless  imagery."  And  I  open  the  last  number  of  Harper's 
Magazine  (March,  1890)  to  find  Dr.  Charles  Waldstein,  in  a  paper  on 
The  Restored  Head  of  Iris,  expressing  himself  thus :  "  There  may  be 
more  true  life  in  stone  than  in  the  sound  of  the  waving  reeds,  and  the 
shout  of  dying  men,  when  heard  re-echoing  through  the  riotous  brain 
of  truth -ignoring  posterity."  If  these  are  examples  of  good  English 
prose,  Sidney's  use  of  compounds  may  well  be  pardoned,  if  not 
applauded.  But  on  this  supposition,  what  shall  we  say  to  the  authority 
of  Aristotle  and  the  views  held  by  many  modern  rhetoricians  and 
stylists?  With  respect  to  compound  epithets  in  general,  and  especially 
in  poetry,  they  have  been  rare  when  Latin  influence  has  been  in  the 
ascendant,  and  have  multiplied  under  the  stimulus  of  a  revived  Teu- 
tonism  or  Hellenism.  The  oldest  English  and  modern  German  are 
here  at  one  with  the  flexible  Greek,  and  antagonistic  to  the  more  pro- 
saic Latin.  Chaucer  has  but  few  compounds;  Cynewulf,  Chapman,  and 
Tennyson  have  many.  See  Coleridge's  remarks  on  the  subject  in  his 
Biographia  Liter  aria,  ch.  I. 

55  28.  Now  of  versifying,  etc.  For  the  attempt  to  revive  classical 
metres  in  English,  see  Church,  Speftser,  pp.  18-28. 

56  9.  For  the  ancient.  Sidney  seems  not  to  have  emancipated  him- 
self from  the  notion  that  the  ancient  metres  could  be  reproduced  in 
the  modern  languages  by  means  of  quantity,  as  well  as  imitated  by 
means  of  accent. 

56  17.  Rime.  Here  apparently  =  (accentual)  rhythm,  metre,  as  in 
Minsheu's  Guide  into  the  Tongues  (London,  1627).  In  56  23,  "the 
very  rime  itself,"  the  modern  meaning  is  resumed  (cf.  5  5  33,  56  3).  See 
also  Webbe's  Discourse  of  English  Poetry  (Haslewood,  2.  55-6)  : 
"The  falling  out  of  verses  together  in  one  like  sound  is  commonly 
called  in  English,  rime,  taken  from  the  Greek  word  pvd/j.6s,  which 
surely  in  my  judgment  is  very  abusively  applied  to  such  a  sense.  .  .  . 
For  rime  is  properly  the  just  proportion  of  a  clause  or  sentence,  whether 
it  be  in  prose  or  metre,  aptly  comprised  together,  .  .  .  and  is  proper 
not  only  to  poets,  but  also  to  readers,  orators,  pleaders,  or  any  which 
are  to  pronounce  or  speak  anything  in  public  audience.  There  be 
three  special  notes  necessary  to  be  observed  in  the  framing  of  our 
accustomed  English  rime.  The  first  is  that  one  metre  or  verse  be 
answerable  to  another,  in  equal  number  of  feet  or  syllables,  or  propor- 
tionable to  the  tune  whereby  it  is  to  be  read  or  measured.  The  second, 
to  place  the  words  in  such  sort  as  none  of  them  be  wrested  contrary  to 
the  natural  inclination  or  affectation  of  the  same,  or,  more  truly,  the  true 
quantity  thereof.    The  third,  to  make  them  fall  together  mutually  in 


132 


NOTES, 


rime,  that  is,  in  words  of  like  sound,  but  so  as  the  words  be  not  dis- 
ordered for  the  rime's  sake,  nor  the  sense  hindered." 

56  19.  Observe  the  accent.  Cf.  Daniel,  Defeiise  of  Rime  (Haslewood, 
2.  198)  :  "And  though  it  doth  not  strictly  observe  long  and  short  sylla- 
bles, yet  it  most  religiously  respects  the  accent;  and  as  the  short  and 
the  long  make  number,  so  the  acute  and  grave  accent  yield  harmony — , 
and  harmony  is  likewise  number;  so  that  the  English  verse  then  hath 
number,  measure,  and  harmony  in  the  best  proportion  of  music,  which, 
being  more  certain  and  more  resounding,  works  that  effect  of  motion 
with  as  happy  success  as  either  the  Greek  or  Latin." 

57  1.   So  that,  etc.    Cf.  31  30-32. 

57  3.  Since  the  blames,  etc.    Cf.  44  3-8. 
574.  Since  the  cause,  etc.    Cf.  44  14-53  6. 
57  6.  Since,  lastly,  etc.    Cf.  55  10-56  35. 
57  12.  Rimer.    Cf.  Shak.  Ant.  5.  2.  215-6: 

Scald  rimers 
Ballad  us  out  of  tune. 

Cf.  Harington  (Haslewood,  2.  123)  :  "The  common  sort,  that  .  .  , 
rather  in  scorn  than  in  praise  bestow  the  name  of  a  poet  on  every  base 
rimer  and  ballad-maker." 

57  15.  That  no,  etc.  Cf.  ^Q.2X\g<tx,  Poetics  104.  a.  2:  "By  none  of 
the  precepts  of  the  philosophers  can  you  become  better  or  more  cour- 
teous than  from  the  reading  of  Virgil." 

57  17.  Clauserus,  Conrad  C.  Clauser  (ca.  1520-1611).  A  German 
scholar.  His  edition  of  Cornutus  and  Palaephatus  appeared  at  Basle  in 
1543- 

57  18.  Cornutus.  A  Stoic,  the  teacher  of  Persius,  the  Roman  satirist, 
honored  and  beloved  by  him,  but  banished  by  Nero  on  account  of  his 
upright  life. 

5722.  Mysteries.  Cf.  Harington  (Haslewood,  2.  127-8):  "The 
ancient  poets  have  indeed  wrapped  as  it  were  in  their  writings  divers 
and  sundry  meanings,  which  they  call  the  senses  or  mysteries  thereof. 
.  .  .  The  men  of  greatest  learning  and  highest  wit  in  the  ancient 
times  did  of  purpose  conceal  these  deep  mysteries  of  learning,  and  as 
it  were  cover  them  with  the  veil  of  fables  and  verse  for  sundry  causes. 
One  cause  was  that  they  might  not  be  rashly  abused  by  profane  wits." 

57  24.  Landino.  A  Florentine  humanist  (1424-1504).  Commen- 
tator on  Dante,  Horace,  and  Virgil,  translator  of  Pliny,  lecturer  on 
Petrarch,  and  author  of  the  Camaldolese  Discussions,  in  which  the 
active  and  the  contemplative  life  are  compared.  Cf.  Symonds,  Renais- 
sance in  Italy  2.  338  ff. 


NOTES. 


133 


5  7  25.  Divine  fury.    Cf.  43  14. 

57  32.  Liber  tino  patre  natus.  From  Horace,  Sat.  I.  6.  6:  "The  son 
of  a  freedman." 

57  34.  Si  quid,  etc.  Virgil,  ^neid  g.  446:  "If  aught  my  verse 
can  do." 

58  4.  Cataract  of  Nilus,  Cf.  Cicero,  Vision  of  Scipio  :  "  The  ears 
of  mankind,  filled  with  these  sounds  (i.e.  the  music  of  the  spheres), 

^  have  become  deaf,  for  of  all  your  senses  it  is  the  most  blunted.  Thus 
the  people  who  live  near  the  place  where  the  Nile  rushes  down  from 
very  high  mountains  to  the  parts  which  are  called  Catadupa  are  desti- 
tute of  the  sense  of  hearing,  by  reason  of  the  greatness  of  the  noise." 
Montaigne  tells  the  story,  Bk.  I.  ch.  22. 

58  8.  Mome.  Dolt,  blockhead.  Cf.  Shak.  Err.  3.  1.32.  Momus. 
The  ancient  personification  of  censure  and  mockery. 

58  10.  Midas.  Cf.  Ovid,  J/^/^z;//.  1 1.  146-193.  Buhonax.  Probably 
for  Bupalus.  Cf.  Pliny,  Nat.  Hist.  36.  12:  "  Bupalus  and  Athenis  were 
very  celebrated  in  their  art  (i.e.  sculpture),  and  were  contemporary 
with  the  poet  Hipponax,  who  certainly  lived  in  the  sixtieth  Olympiad. 
.  .  .  Hipponax  was  remarkably  ugly,  and  the  two  artists,  by  way  of 
a  joke,  exposed  his  portrait  to  the  ridicule  of  the  public.  The  indig- 
nation of  Hipponax  being  aroused  by  this  act,  he  directed  against  them 
the  bitterness  of  his  poems  to  such  effect  that,  according  to  some 
writers,  they  hanged  themselves  in  despair;  but  this  opinion  is  false." 
We  have  seen  that  Sidney  often  misquotes,  whether  intentionally  or 
otherwise.  Here  he  has  apparently  confused  the  two  names  Bupalus 
and  Hipponax,  and  thus  blended  them  into  the  one,  Bubonax. 


VARIANTS. 


The  following  variants  are  based  upon  a  collation  of  the  reprints  by 
Arber  and  FlUgel,  which  are  presumed  to  be  literal  transcripts  of  the 
editions  printed  in  1595  by  Olney  and  Ponsonby  respectively.  How 
far  these  do  actually  represent  the  two  earliest  texts  I  am  in  no  position 
to  state,  but  the  errors,  if  any,  must  be  few  and  unimportant.  Except 
for  the  rejection  of  his  as  the  possessive  sign  of  the  noun,  I  have  rarely 
ventured,  in  the  construction  of  the  text,  to  reject  the  authority  of  both 
the  early  copies.  These  instances  will  all  be  found  recorded  in  their 
proper  places,  and  are  mostly  confined  to  cases  where  the  retention  of 
the  older  forms  would  have  occasioned  a  manifest  transgression  of 
grammatical  concord,  or  where  a  form,  like  Pindarus,  41  23,  would  have 
constituted  a  noticeable  exception. 

It  must  be  understood  that  no  attempt  has  been  made  to  note  mere 
differences  of  spelling  and  punctuation.  This  would  have  been  imprac- 
ticable without  greatly  increasing  the  bulk  of  th^  volume,  and  would 
have  served  no  useful  purpose  that  could  not  be  quite  as  readily  served 
by  consulting  the  reprints  which  I  have  used. 


1 1.  Edward  Wotton.  P.  E.W. 

1 21.  the.    O.  a. 

1 28.  be,    O.  are. 

2 1.  Pugliano's.O.Y\x^\2iX\o\\vi. 

2  8.  since.  O.  sith  (and  always, 
except  23.7). 

2 15.  latter.    P.  later. 

2 19.  inveigh.    P.  envey. 

2  23.  by.    P.  omits. 

2  24-25.    they  now.    P.  you. 

2  28.  her.    P.  his. 

2  29.  Hesiod.    O.  Hesiodus. 

2  34.  to  their.    P.  to  the. 

2  35.  77iay.    P.  nay. 

3 10.  Boccace.    P.  Bocace. 


3  14.    as  in.    P.  as. 

3 18.  masks.    P.  mask. 

3  24.  hidden.    O.  hid. 

3  31.  standeth.    P.  stands. 

3  32.  feigjteth.    P.  feigns. 

3  32.  to  speak.    P.  speak. 

4  3.  knoweih.    P.  knows. 
4  8.  the.    O.  omits. 

4 10.  stole.    P.  stale. 

4  24.  goeth.    P.  goes. 

4  27.  areytos.    P.  arentos. 

4  32.  exercise.    O.  exercises. 

5  18.  any.    P.  any  of. 

5  22.  making.  P.  as  it  is  re- 
ported by  many. 


VARIANTS, 


135 


5  26.  although.  O.  which  al- 
though. 

5  27.  that.    P.  omits. 

5  33.  the.    P.  by  the. 

6  3.  further.    P.  farther. 
6  4.  vates.    P.  vatis. 

6  7.  of.    O.  omits. 

6  20.  y^^zr.    O.  fear  me. 

6  28.  called.    P.  named. 

6  28.  7roL7]Tr}j/.    O.  a  poet. 

6  30.  TTote?!/.    O.  poiein. 

6  35.  ^7/2)/.    O.  my. 

7  1.  O.  to. 

7  6.  J^/.    O.  setteth. 

7  7.  ^/^7.    P.  doth. 

7  9.  musician.    P.  musicians. 
7  12.  passions.    P.  or  pas- 

sions. 

7  28.  into.    O.  omits. 

7  34.  within.    O.  only  within. 

8  7.  cunning.    P.  comming. 

8 13.  <7;rF.    P.  every. 

8 14.  O.  the. 
8 18.  hath.  P.  had. 
8  32.  far.    P.  omits. 

8  33.  argument.    P.  arguments. 

9  7.  ///^  more.    O.  more. 
9 13.  P.  the, 

9 13.  /xlfn](TLS.    O.  mimesis. 

9 17.  general.    O.  several. 

9 19.  inconceivable.  P.  uncon- 
ceivable. 

9  23.  Franciscus.    P.  F. 

9  28.  Greeks.    P.  Greek. 

9  29.  James'.  P.  Paul's.  O. 
James  his. 

9  35.  and.    P.  omits. 

10  3.  judgment.   O.  judgments. 

10  7.    free.    O.  omits. 

11  5.  sort  of  verse.  O.  sorts  of 
verses. 

11  18.  wrote.    O.  writ. 

12  7.    clay.    O.  clayey. 
12  8.    of    O.  of  the. 
12  17.  by.    P.  omits. 


12  21.    into.    P.  in. 
12  26.    each.    P.  omits. 
12  28.    called.  P.  omits. 
12  28.    apxiTeKTOj/LKT}.    O.  arki- 
tectonike. 

12  33.    further.    O.  farther. 

13  5.  poet  is  worthy  to  have  it 
before  any.  O.  poet's  nobleness  by 
setting  him  before  his. 

13  6.     as.    P.  omits. 
13  7.     thinketh.    P.  thinks. 
13  23.    contain.    O.  containeth. 
P.  contains. 

13  24.    extendeth.    P.  extends. 
13  27.   giveih.    P.  gives. 
13  31.    of    P.  omits. 
13  33.    thousand.    P.  looo. 
13  35.   goeth.    P.  goes. 

13  35.    runneth.    P.  runs. 

14  3.     virtuous.    P.  virtue's. 

14  4-5.  testis  .  .  .  vitcB.  O.  lux 
vitse,  temporum  magistra,  vita  me- 
morise. 

14 17.  co7tfirming.  O.  confer- 
ring. 

14  18.    by  story.    P.  by  stories. 

14  21.    maketh.    P.  makes. 

15  2.     and  Justice.    P.  omits. 
15  2.     seeketh.    P.  seeks. 

15  12.    in  that.    P.  in  the. 

15  18.    argujuents.  O.  argument. 

15  33.    in.    P.  by. 

16  8.     an.    O.  the. 

16 11.    conceit.    O.  conceits. 
1 6  14.    that.    O.  the. 
16  17.    definitions.  O.  definition. 
16  17.    virtues  or.    O.  virtue. 

16  28.  said.  O.  P.  say.  Ed.  of 
1598,  said. 

17  7.     Gnatho.    O.  P.  Gnato. 
17 10.    states.    O.  seats. 

17  23.    poesy.    P.  poetry. 

17  26.    attained.    O.  obtained. 

18  4.  Lazarus  in.  O.  Lazarus 
being  in. 


136 


VARIANTS, 


18  7.  mine,    O.  my. 

38 18.  make,    P.  makes. 

18 19.  those.    O.  these. 

18  22.  bringeth.    P.  brings. 

18  27.  <pL\0(TO(pU>T€pOJ/,     P.  ^lA.- 

oao(f)(oT€poDv.    O.  philosophoteron. 

18  27.  ffirov^aLSrepov.  P.  airov- 
haiorepov,    O.  spoudaioteron. 

18  28.  studiously  serious,  P. 
omits. 

18  29.  KaeSXov,    O.  Katholou. 

18  31.  Kad'  eKacTov.  O.Katheka- 
ston. 

18  34.  marketh.    O.  marks. 

19 11.  in  Xenophon.  O.  of 
Xenophon. 

19  17.  foul  and.  P.  full. 
19  27.  Qui7itus,    P.  Q. 

19  33.  it  hath.    P.  hath  it. 

20  7.  poetically,    O.  poetical. 

20 11.  a  poet,    P.    an  poet. 

20 12.  do  concur.    P.  did. 

20  12.  do  both,    P.  doth  both. 

20  34.  pleaseth.    P.  please. 

21  2.  yet.    P.  so  yet. 

21  5.  history.    O.  histories. 

21  6.  gotten,    P.  got. 

21  9.  setteth.    P.  sets. 

21 19.  historian.    P.  history. 

21 29.  sixteen  hundred.  O.  P. 
l6oo. 

21  33.  liter  as.    P.  litteras. 

22  2.  occidendos.  P.  occidentos. 
22  3.  you,    O.  your. 

22  6.  iiijustice.    O.  unjustice. 

22  9.  deserveth.    P.  deserves. 

22 12.  poet.    P.  poets. 

22  16.  teach,    O.  doth  teach. 

22  18.  (piKo<()L\6ao(pos,  O.  philo- 
philosophos. 

22  21.  both.    O.  omits. 

22  21.  and  the.    P.  and. 

22  26.  yvwais.  P.  yvoais  O. 
gnosis. 

22  2G,  27.    TTpalLs.    O,  praxis. 


22  27.  cannot,    P.  can. 

23  7.  siitce.    O.  seeing. 

23 14.  conceit,    O.  conceits. 

23 18.  vejy.    O.  omits. 

23  32.  of  the.    O.  of. 

23  33.  rhubarb.  P.  rhabarbrum. 
O.  rubarb. 

24  2.  y^neas,  O.  and  ^neas. 
24  4.  valor.    P.  value. 

24 14.  P.  of. 

24 16.  wisheth.    P.  vi^ished. 

24 17.  do.    P.  doth. 
24 17.  those,    O.  the. 

24  24.  virtue.    P.  virtus. 

24  26.  Boethius.    P.  Poetius. 

25  10.  ^zV//^r.    O.  omits. 
25  14.  behaves.    P.  behave. 
25  23.  ^z/d-r.    P.  only. 

25  29.  murder,  O.  P.  murther 
(and  always). 

26  6.  ensueth,    P.  ensue. 

26 13.  or,    P.  and. 

26 14.  a.    O.  an. 

26  17.  defectious.  P.  defectuous. 

26  22.  like.    P.  omits. 

26  23.  Samtazzaro,    O.  Sanaz- 

zar.    P.  Sanazara. 

26  35.  lords  and.    O.  lords  or. 

27  5.  contention.  P.contentons. 

27 12.  it.    P.  in. 

27 13.  bezvaileth.    O.  bevi^ails. 
27 17.  lamentation,    P.  lamen- 
tations. 

27 19.  who,    O.  which. 

2  7  24.  till    O.  until. 

27  33.  ai^gument.  P.  arguments. 

27  33.  answer  after.  P.  after 
answer. 

28 11.  an,    P.  omits. 

28  16.  comedian.  P.  comedient. 
28  17.  evil.    P.  the  evil. 

28  22.  to.    O.  omits. 

28  24.  find.    P.  see. 

28  28.  tdcers.  O.  vicers  (mis- 
print ?) . 


VARIANTS, 


137 


28  35.    auctorem.    O.  P.  autho- 


rem. 

29  5. 

29  16. 

2919. 

29  22. 

29  27. 

29  28. 
valour. 

29  29. 

29  33. 

30  2. 
matters. 

30  15. 
30 19. 
30  22. 
30  28. 
30  33. 

30  35. 
312. 
318. 

3110. 

3118. 
3121. 
3127. 
3129. 
nor  end 
3131. 
3131 
3135. 

31  35. 

32  6. 
ing. 

3211. 
32  14. 
crot.  O. 
32  21. 

32  27. 
ities. 

33  11. 
33  11. 
33  20. 

ers. 
33  29. 
33  34. 


blood,    P.  bloods. 
giveth,    O.  gives. 
mine.    O.  my. 
it  is,    O.  is  it. 
such.    P.  such-like. 
valor,     P.  valure. 


O. 


think.    P.  think  one  of. 
be.    O.  be  the. 
matters  rather,  P.  rather 

it.    P.  him. 

through.    O.  throughout. 
setteth.    O.  sets. 
kind.    P.  kinds. 
he.    P.  be  (misprint?). 
the.    P.  omits. 
human,    O.  P.  humane. 
most,    O.  not. 
even,    P.  omits. 
learnings.    O.  learning. 

O.  nor  no. 
only.    P.  only,  only, 
/^/j  end  containeth,  P. 
containing. 

O.  and  to. 
•32.    of  it.    O.  omits. 
and.    P.  omits. 
leaveth.    O.  leaves. 
triumphant,  O.  triumph- 

O.  may  be. 

lXl(TOfXOV<TOL.      P.  fXVaOfXOV' 

.  mysomousoi. 
rt;.    O.  omits. 
commodity,   P.  commod- 

hu?nor,    O.  humors. 

iming.    P.  in  riming. 


2J  ; 

considereth. 


O.  consid- 


trea surer.  P.  treasure. 
<?«^.    O.  one  word. 


33  35.  accusing.  O.  accuseth. 
34 10.    zvord.    O.  words. 

34 10.  needeth,    P.  needs. 

34 11.  P.  omits. 

34  15-16.  as,  Percontatorem,  .  .  . 
sumus.    O.  omits. 

34 19.    mathematic,    P.  mathe- 
matics. 
34  33. 

34  35. 

35  6. 
35  14. 

35  32. 

36  4. 
36  6. 
36 14. 
36  14. 
36 19. 
36  24. 
36  25. 
36  30. 


fancies.    O.  fancy. 
ear,    O.  erre. 
had  ove9'shot.  O.  outshot. 
poesy,    O.  poetry. 
affirmetk.    O.  affirms, 
writeth.    O.  writes. 
into.    P.  unto. 
thinketh.    O.  thinks. 
wrote.    O.  writ. 
at  that,    P.  to  the. 
may,    O.  omits. 
but,    O.  omits. 
proveth,    O.  proves. 
36  31,32.    fT/Z/^d-.    O.  a. 
36  32.   putteth.    O.  puts. 
chess.    P.  chestes. 
///^  ^7;^/^/.    P.  only. 
ambitiously.     P.  amba- 


371. 
3710. 
3715. 
tiously. 
3  7  24. 
37  25. 

3  7  32. 
O.  eikastike. 
37  33.  things. 


forth.    P.  for. 
whatsoever.  P, 
eiKa<TTiK7).  P. 


what. 

pLKaJTlKT], 


37  34. 
tike. 

37  35. 

38  5. 
Goliah. 

38  10. 
38 15. 
O.  conceiveth 
38  27.  say. 

38  31. 

39  9. 
39 11. 
39 16. 


P.  thing. 
(pavracTLKT).  O.  phantas- 


that.    P.  omits. 
Goliath,    P.  Golias. 


O. 


do.    P.  to  (misprint?). 
receiveth,      P.  receives. 


P.  said. 
upon.    P.  omits. 
in.    O.  on. 
these.    P.  those. 
digression.  P.disgression. 


138 


VARIANTS. 


39  31.  opposed.    P.  apposed. 

40  8.  was  ever.    O.  ever  was. 
40  18.  never.    O.  never  well. 
40  20.  fourscore.    O.  8o. 

40  30.  sepulchre.    P.  sepulture. 

40  30.  Cato's.    O.  Cato  his. 

40  33.  that.    O.  now. 

40  33.  Plato's.  O.  P.  Plato  his. 
41 13.  shops.    P.  shop. 

41  17.  strave.    O.  strove. 
41 21.  where.    O.  when. 
4123.  Pindar.      O.    P.  Pin- 

darus. 

41 28.  cavillations.  O.  cavilla- 
tion. 

41 34.  doth.    O.  did. 

42  6-8.  who  .  .  .  prophet.  P. 
omits. 

42  8.  setteth.    P.  sets. 

42  29.  coitstrue.  O.  conster.  P. 
consture. 

42  31.  atque.    P.  atq. 

42  32.  republica.    P.  rep. 

43  1.  the.    P.  omits. 
43  4.  u7ito.    O.  to. 
43  5.  unto.    P.  to. 

43 14.  forenamed.  O.  afore- 
named. 

43  21.  Heautontinioroumenos.  O. 
P.  Heautontimorumenon. 

43  27.  needs.    O.  need. 

43  33.  his.    O.  her. 

43  34.  that.  P.  to  have  showed. 

44  9.  our.    P.  the. 
44 12.  held.    O.  had. 

44  12.  ill- savored.  O.  ill-favor- 
ing. 

44 15.  it.    P.  omits. 

44 19.  proceedeth.    P.  proceeds. 

4419.  wit.  P.  with  (misprint?). 

44 19.  others.    O.  other. 

44  22.  meinora.    P.  memoria. 

44  24.  thousand.    P.  thousands. 

45  6.  find.  P.  sinde  (editor's 
misprint  ?) . 


45  7.  lamentethy  decketh.  P. 

laments,  decks. 

45  26.  men.    O.  omits. 

45  30.  post.    P.  pass. 

45  34.  outfiowings,  O.  outflow- 
ing. 

46  9.  but.  O.  but  I. 
46 19.  hath.  P.  have. 
46  21.  is  it.    P.  is. 

46  26.  wings.    P.  wrings. 

47  3.  conabar.    P.  conabor. 
47  3.  ^r«/.    O.  P.  erit. 

47  4.  O.  an. 

47  7.  Cressida.  O.  Cresseid. 
P.  Creseid. 

47 11.  reverend.  O.  reverent. 
P.  reverent  an. 

47  15.  eclogues.  O.  P.  eglogues. 

47 19.  Sannazzaro.     O.  Sana- 

zar.    P.  Sanazara. 

4719.  I  do.    O.  dol. 

47  26.  tinkling.   O.  P.  tinghng. 

47  27.  reason.    P.  reasons. 

47  33.  Seneca's.  O.  P.  Seneca 
his. 

48 1.  truth.    O.  troth. 

48  9.  ana  many.    P.  and. 
48 14.  co7?ieth.    P.  comes. 
48 19.  and.    P.  omits. 

48  29.  falleth.    O.  falls. 

49  3.  have.    O.  hath. 
49  4.  hit.    P.  hit  it. 

49  5.  cojttaineth.    P.  contains. 

4915.  it.    P.  in  (misprint?). 
49  25.     Trojan.     O.  P.  Troyan. 

49  35.  leaving  the  rest.  P.  the 
rest  leaving. 

50 1.  needs.    O.  need. 

50  6.  the  clown.    O.  clowns. 

50  23.  comedians.  P.  comedi- 
ents. 

5  0  25.  it.    P.  is  (misprint?). 

514.  and.    O.  or. 

51  9.  sorry.    O.  sorry,  jet. 
51 14.  in.    P.  in  a. 


VARIANTS. 


139 


51  17.  procureth.    P.  procures. 

51 20.  stir.    O.  stirreth. 

51 21.  mixed.    P.  mix. 

51 33.  a  heartless.  P.  and  a 
heartless. 

51 34.  wry-.    O.  awry-. 

52  14.  fruits.    O.  fruit. 
52  27.  enough.    O.  enow. 

52  34.  that.    P.  it  that. 

53  2.  far-fet.    P.  far-set. 

53  2.  Z/^^z/  many.  O.  they  may. 

53  23.  wj^^/.    P.  useth. 

53  23.  as.    O.  omits. 

53  24.  Vivit?    P.  etvincit. 

53  24.  vero  etiam.    O.  P.  omit. 

53  24.  in  senatum  venit.  O. 

senatum  venit.  P.  in  senatum 
venit,  imo  in  senatum  venit. 

53  27-28.  in  choler  do.  O.  do  in 
choler. 

53  30.  too.    O.  to  too. 

53  30-54  4.  Ho7v  zvell .  .  .  their 
fineness.  O.  omits. 

54  5.  Now.  O.  Fow. 
54  7.  may.    O.  omits. 

54  14.  whit,  P.  with  (misprint  ?) . 


54  23.  knacks.    O.  tracks. 

54  26.  than.    O.  than  to  speak. 

54  28.  S77iall-.    O.  smally. 

55  3.  the.    O.  this. 

55  3.  digression.  P.disgression. 
55  15, 16.    wanteth.    P.  wants. 

55 18.  in.    O.  of. 

55  23.  conceits.    P.  conceit. 

55  34.  more.    O.  most. 

56  1.  tune.    P.  time. 

56  5.  obtaineth.    O.  obtains. 

56  17.  for.    O.  for  the. 

56  27.  the  Italians  term.  P. 
Italian. 

56  28.  is.    O.  omits. 

56  33.  already  I find.  O.  I  find 
already. 

56  34.  trifiingness.    P.  triflings. 

57  4.  it  is.    P.  is. 

57  24.  Landino.   O.  P.  Landin. 

57  33.  Herctdea.    O.  Hercules. 

58  1.  Beatrice.  O.  P.  Beatrix. 
58  4.  cataract.  O.  cataphract. 
58  7.  of.    P.  omits. 

58 13.  send.    R  sent. 

58  14.  get.    P.  yet  (misprint?). 


INDEX  OF  PROPER  NAMES. 


Abradatas  20  22,  27. 
Abraham  18  4,  38  3. 
Achilles  16  35,  24  2,  30  15,  40  11. 
Adam  8  34. 
Adrian  44  25. 

^neas  8  11,  17  16,  19  12,  20,  24  2,  15, 

30  15,  32,  37  5. 
^sop  18  16,  36  13,  14,  43  24. 
Afric  40  28,  48  13. 
Agamemnon  16  31,  17  4. 
Agincourt  14  10. 
Agrippa,  C,  32  30,  34. 
Agrippa,  M.,  see  Menenius  Agrippa. 
Ajax  16  29. 
Albinus  5  23. 
Albion  391. 
Alcibiades  18  35. 

Alexander  19  23,  27  7,  39  34,  40  4, 

43  18,  51 11. 
Alexander  Pheraeus  29  2. 
Alphonsus  of  Aragon  14  20. 
Amadis  de  Gaule  24  12. 
Amphion  3  5,  9  27. 
Anchises  16  25,  24  15,  58  2. 
Antonius  54  16. 
Apollo  4  4,  43  23. 
Apuleius  50  10. 

Ariosto,  see  Orlando,  Orlando  Fu- 
rioso. 

Aristotle  9 12,  1825, 19 1,  22  26,  24  8, 

40  5,  43  27,  48  8,  5  1  23,  57  12. 
Arthur  39  25. 
Asia  40  28,  48 12. 


Athenians  41  20,  21. 
Athens  3  32. 
Atreus  17  5,  19 19. 

Babylon  55  20. 
Babylonians  20  14,  17. 
Beatrice  58  1. 
Bembus  44  29,  57  14. 
Beza  44  30. 
Bibbiena  44  29. 
Boccace  (Boccaccio),  3  10. 
Boethius  24  26,  26  24. 
Britons  4  35. 
Brutus  14  20. 
Bubonax  58  10. 
Buchanan  44  33,  52  4. 
Bupalus,  see  Bubonax, 

Caesar  21  29,  31,  43  19, 
Calicut  49  15. 
Callisthenes  40  6. 
Calypso  16  27. 
Canidia  19  15,  16. 
Catiline  53  22. 

Cato  10  1,  34  13,  40  12,  14,  24,  30. 
Cato  Uticensis  21  28,  40 15. 
Chariclea  11  18. 
Charon  35  29. 

Chaucer  3  12,  17  8,  35  1,  476. 

Christ  17  32,  32  2,  4  2  25. 

Cicero  11  15,  21  26,  54  17,  18  (see 

also  Tully). 
Clauserus  57  17.  ' 


INDEX  OF  PROPER  NAMES, 


141 


Cornutus  57  18. 
Crassus  54  17. 
Cupid  37  14. 
Curtius,  Quintus  19  27. 
Cypselus  22  3. 

Cyrus  8  10,  21,  23,  11  15, 17  15, 19  10, 
11,  20,  20  22,  24  2,  30  15,  3  7  5. 

Daedalus  46  24,  25. 
Danes  5  3. 

Dante  3  10,  20  34,  58  1. 

Dares  Phrygius  19  12. 

Darius  20  13,  19,  27  7. 

David  6  5,  9  19,  25  28,  35,  36 12,  38  4, 

44  25. 
Davus  28  13. 
Deborah  9  21. 
Delphos  5  33. 
Demea  28  12. 
Demosthenes  53  13,  32. 
Dido  31  1. 
Diomedes  16  35. 
Dionysius  22  4,  41  25. 
Dives  17  34,  18  4. 
Douglas  29  21. 

Empedocles  3  18. 
Ennius  3  8,  40  13. 
Epaminondas  45  22. 
Erasmus  32  31,  34. 
Euripides  41  20,  49  34. 
Euryalus  17  1. 

Fracastorius  44  31. 
Francis  of  France  44  28. 
Fulvius  40  12,  14. 

Gadatas,  see  Abradatas. 
Germanicus  44  25. 
Gnatho  17  7,  28  13. 
Goliath  38  5. 
Gorboduc  47  30,  48  11. 
Goths  39  5. 
Gower  3  11. 


Gyges  4  2. 

Hecuba  49  28. 
Helicon  45  30. 
Heliodorus  11 16. 
Heraclitus  27  14. 
Hercules  24  2,  51  13. 
Herodotus  4  8,  20  12. 
Hesiod  2  29,  57  18. 
Hiero  I.  41  24. 
Hipponax,  see  Bubonax. 
Holofernes  38  4. 

Homer  2  29,  9  27,  39  29,  40  6,  9, 

41  17,  57  19. 
Horace  19  16,  31  10,  34  12,  39  20, 

49  20. 
Hospital  44  34. 
Hungary  29  26. 

Indians  4  26,  53  18. 
Ireland  4  23,  58  12. 
Isaac  38  4. 
Ithaca  16  28. 

James  of  Scotland  44  28. 
James,  St.  9  29. 
Job  9  22. 

John  of  the  Nokes  36  31. 
John  of  the  Stile  36  31. 
Judith  38  4. 

Junius,  Franciscus  9  23. 
Justin  19  11,  20  12. 

Lacedaemonians  29  30. 
Laelius  43  19. 
Landino  57  24. 
Lazarus  17  34,  18  4. 
Linus  2  32. 

Livius  Andronicus  3  8. 
Livy  20  20. 
Lucan  10  3. 
Lucretia  10  17,  18. 
Lucretius  10  1. 

Manilius  10  2. 


142 


INDEX  OF  PROPER  NAMES, 


^xarathon  14  9. 
Marius  21  25. 
Mars  45  11,  16. 
Medea  17  7. 
Melancthon  44  30. 
Meliboeus  26  34. 
Menelaus  16  32. 
Menenius  Agrippa  25  6. 
Midas  58  10. 
Miltiades  21  22. 
Mirror  of  Magistrates  47  11. 
Momus  58  8. 

More,  Sir  Thomas  17  17,  18. 
Moses  9  21. 
Muretus  44  32. 
Musaeus  2  29. 

Muses  2  17,  4  9,  36  6,  45  28,  57  9. 

Nathan  25  27,  36 11. 
Nilus  58  4. 
Nisus  17  1. 
Nizolian  53  14. 
Normans  5  3. 

CEdipus  17  3. 

Olympus  (for  Olympia)  30  7. 

Omphale  51  15. 

Orlando  8  9. 

Orlando  Furioso  39  25. 

Orpheus  2  32,  3  6,  9  27. 

Ovid  32  28,  47  2. 

Pacolet  49  16. 
Pallas  46  7. 
Pandar  17  8. 
Parmenides  3  19. 
Paul,  St.  42  6. 
Percy  29  20. 
Periander  22  3. 
Peru  49  14. 
Petrarch  3  11. 
Phalaris  22  4. 
Pharsalia  14  9. 
Philip  of  Macedon  30  6. 
Phocion  21  23. 


Phocylides  3  20,  9  35. 

Pindar  29  26,  30  1,  8,  41  23. 

Plato  3  27,  14  8,  24  26,  30  20,  35  6, 

40  33,  41  5,  25,  30,  34,  42  9,  10, 

28,  43  2,  4,  8,  26,  44  8. 
Plautus  49  3,  50  13. 
Plutarch  29  1,  40  1,  3,  4131,  42  20, 

43  29,  30. 
Pluto  40  21. 
Poitiers  14  10. 
Polydorus  49  23,  35. 
Polymnestor  49  24. 
Pompey  21  26. 
Pontanus  10  2,  44  32. 
Priamus  49  24,  26. 
Pugliano  1  3,  2  1. 
Pylades  8  9. 
Pythagoras  3  20. 

Rinaldo  30  16. 

Robert,  King  of  Sicily  44  27. 
Robin  Hood  35  6. 

Sackville,  see  Gorboduc,  Mirror  of 

Magistrates. 
Sannazzaro  26  23,  47  19. 
Saxons  5  3. 

Scaliger,  Julius  33  15,  42  30,  44  31, 
5715. 

Scipio  19  24,  40  27,  43  19. 
Scipio  Nasica  40  25. 
Seneca  47  33. 
Severus  2  1  24,  25. 
Shepherd's  Calendar  47  14. 
Sibylla  5  33. 
Simonides  41  23. 

Socrates  2  1  23,  43  20  (Lselius  called 

the  Roman  S.),  43  22. 
Solomon  9  20. 
Solon  3  21,  25. 
Sophocles  16  29,  44  25. 
Spenser,  see  Shepherd's  Calendar. 
Sphinx  38  33. 
Surrey,  Earl  of  47  13. 
Sylla  21  25,  31. 


INDEX  OF  PROPER  NAMES, 


Syracusans  41  21. 

Tantalus  19  19. 
Tarquinius  20  20. 
Tartars  39  29. 
Terence  43  21,  48  35. 
Thales  3  18. 
Theagenes  8  8,  11  17. 
Thebes  3  6,  36  17,  19. 
Theocritus  47  18. 
Thrace  49  25,  32. 
Thraso  28  13,  5  1  34. 
Tityrus  27  1. 

TremelHus,  Emanuel  9  23. 
Troy  16  26. 

Tully  30  20,  53  13,  21  (see  also 

Cicero). 
Turkey  4  21. 
Turks  39  28. 
Turnus  24  18,  30 16. 


143 

Tydeus  30 16. 
Tyrtseus  3  21,  9  35. 

Ulysses  16  26,  35,  19  20,  21  12. 
Utopia  17  17. 

Venice  45  14. 
Venus  45  15. 
Vespasian  19  6. 

Virgil  5  21,  8  11,  10 1,  17  16,  19 12, 

34  12,  47  18,  5717,  58  2. 
Vulcan  45  17. 

Wales  4  34. 
Wotton,  Edward  1 1. 

Xenophon  8  10,  11 13,  17  15,  19 11, 
20  21,  25. 

Zopyrus  20 13. 


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GETTY  RESEARCH  INSTITUTE 


3  3125  01076  6976 


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